Our firm
Röhrs Andrews and Associates Inc t/a power law is a bespoke legal practice based in Johannesburg, South Africa, specialising in energy and corporate & commercial law services. Our experienced attorneys are passionate about providing expert legal advice in these areas of law in the interests of powering the African economy towards a cleaner future. We are a modern, agile, solutions-driven firm aspiring to be a leading specialist energy and commercial practice in Southern Africa.
Always paying close attention to developments in the energy regulatory space, and having a deep understanding of the legal issues impacting energy projects and commercial transactions, we are considered a top choice legal partner.
Meet our team
Sue Röhrs
Director
Johannesburg, South Africa
Career: Sue Röhrs is an energy law specialist with 30 years’ experience
as a legal practitioner in private practice, as Head of Legal for Sappi Southern Africa, as a director of Röhrslaw (a specialist energy law consulting business) and a founding director of power law.
Experience: Sue has extensive experience in the South African electricity industry. She was a member of the Sappi Southern Africa Exco and was
also the head of the Sappi Southern African legal department for 6 out
of the 13 years she spent with the multinational. During that time, she dealt
with a range of legal matters relating to a large multinational legal department including group and local treasury and finance matters,
major litigation, large projects, including construction projects, large contracts across a range of areas (including international), group policies and high-risk matters. Sue was the administrator of the group global legal compliance programme and was a member of various committees (including the audit committee) and steer-coms (environmental and energy). She served as a trustee on the Sappi Provident Fund and Southern African employee trusts (which she assisted in drafting and setting up).
In addition, she advised on and gained both technical and legal experience from the many electricity generation projects undertaken by the company. Her experience in electricity related matters has spanned 13 years with Sappi, as a specialist energy law consultant and practicing attorney. During this time, she has advised renewable energy generators and customers across almost all generation technologies.
Sue also advises industry and business associations on energy related law and policy developments. She is a member of the BUSA energy sub-committee and policy working group and is seconded from BUSA from time to time to NEDLAC stakeholder engagements on energy related matters as a business representative. Some of these engagements relate to the IRP 2019, energy sustainability working groups and the new (2021) proposed ERA Amendment Bill.
She is very familiar with the law, regulation, policy and planning documents pertaining to electricity, both current and contemplated, and has engaged extensively with clients and with Government in this regard.
Sue has researched and given input into all the major policy and planning documents relating to the electricity industry in South Africa, including presenting to the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) and NERSA with regard to policy updates, amendments to the Electricity Regulation Act, 2006 (ERA), including the New Generation Regulations and the Exemption Schedule, and engaging with NERSA often on behalf of IPPs regarding the granting of licences and/or amendments, the registration of exempt activities and government’s interpretation of plans, legislation and policies.
In addition, Sue has extensive “on the ground” experience in engaging with Eskom, municipalities, the DMRE and with NERSA.
She has solid working arrangements with Eskom personnel which she has built up over many years, and has drafted, negotiated and/or concluded a range of Eskom agreements, including Eskom power purchase agreements such as the medium-term power purchase programme (MTPPP), short-term power purchase programme (STPPP), wholesale electricity pricing standard agreements (WEPS), together with Eskom connection and use of the system agreements, genflex agreements, budget quotes and a range of electricity supply agreements and their addenda (dealing with wheeling and net-metering).
She has also been active in the municipal space, having researched and advised on relevant aspects of municipal law, drafted and negotiated municipal use of system agreements, wheeling agreements, amendments to municipal electricity supply agreements to reflect the reconciliation of accounts, and has successfully negotiated with municipalities on behalf of trading clients to allow traders to use municipal networks.
In her role as the electricity and energy legal adviser to PAMSA (the Paper Manufacturers Association) she has prepared mark-ups and suggestions to the IPP Office on conversion of REIPPP agreements to suit cogeneration projects (a number of which were included in both the power purchase agreement and implementation agreement of the Cogeneration RFP). Furthermore, she represented both PAMSA and individual clients with submissions to the IPP Office on the Cogeneration RFP documents once they had been published.
Because of her wide knowledge of electricity law she has been asked to present her views on various challenges to the generation of electricity by IPPs to several fora. She has moderated, and participated in, panel discussion at a number of conferences, and has authored articles in the press and magazines on electricity related matters.
Amongst other things, Sue has engaged with clients across a wide range of electricity generation technologies, in analysing risk; providing opinions on specific aspects of electricity law; working closely with technical experts, in-house or consultants, in developing and attempting to implement optimal solutions for clients; reviewing, drafting, commenting, amending, negotiating and concluding a wide variety of electricity agreements; advising potential traders; obtaining generation licences and amendments to these licences, including motivating for compliance to the IRP for generators; registering small scale embedded generation facilities and cogeneration facilities with NERSA; giving input into the energy strategy of some of the largest listed companies in South Africa; reviewing municipal law and engaging with municipalities, participating in the bid preparation process of the biomass generation plant of a preferred bidder in the REIPPP bid window 4 national procurement process, assisting clients with MTPPP, STPPP and WEPS bid submissions and drafting heads of terms and PPAs for projects in the DRC and Swaziland.
Membership/ Affiliations: Sue is an attorney and conveyancer of the High Court of South Africa (1991), a member of the South African Legal Practice Council, a member of the BUSA energy sub-committee and energy policy working group, a representative of business on NEDLAC energy fora from time to time and a member of SAIPPA.
Education: B.Comm (majoring in Economics and Business Administration) and LL.B – University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg.
Lionel Andrews
Director
Johannesburg, South Africa
Career: Lionel is a commercial attorney with strong experience in M&A transactions and energy projects. Lionel began his career at a full-service commercial litigation firm in 2009, before moving to a niche corporate commercial practice in 2012, where he began to focus his attention on commercial law. In 2015, following his passion for renewable energy, Lionel joined a Johannesburg based clean energy investment business as Group General Counsel. The company developed greenfield and brownfield renewable energy projects and owned and operated South Africa’s only licenced electricity trader (now called POWERX). In 2019, Lionel moved back into private legal practice, first consulting independently as a specialist energy law advisor, and lately, as a founding director of power law.
Experience: Lionel has had well-balanced start to his career, working both in practice as well as outside practice as internal legal counsel, at senior levels. This has afforded him the opportunity to gain first hand practical working experience dealing with the complicated legal issues surrounding all development phases of energy projects, as well as the inner workings of a licenced electricity trader in South Africa. Lionel has also been involved in the drafting and negotiation of contracts and in providing advice on all types of M&A transactions in an energy and private equity context, including in South Africa and several other African countries (Kenya, Tanzania, Mauritius, Mali, Botswana, Namibia and Mozambique).
In his career, Lionel has drafted and negotiated dozens of power purchase agreements (PPAs), including for projects involving private embedded generation, off-grid connections, project finance debt, hybrid technologies, hydrogen e-fuels, and with licenced traders and with wheeling arrangements. Other project agreements which Lionel has drafted, advised on and negotiated include: construction agreements (FIDIC, NEC, JBCC, ENAA and bespoke), operations and maintenance agreements, services agreements, asset-management agreements, energy conversion services agreements, feedstock supply and offtake agreements, waste-to-value agreements, notarial lease agreements, connection and use-of-system agreements (Eskom and municipality) (including with wheeling provisions), distribution agreements and joint development agreements, amongst others. In addition, Lionel has rendered legal opinions on matters such as the enviro-legal requirements triggered by a cogeneration power project, NERSA licensing and registration requirements of various projects and the legal authority of municipalities to enter into connection and wheeling agreements (including whether competitive bidding process need to be followed).
- Lionel’s focus areas extend to energy projects of all technologies (including solar PV, CSP, wind, biomass, biogas, waste-to-energy, hydro, natural gas, battery energy storage, hybrid and cogeneration technologies), and to corporate commercial transactions generally. He is experienced with advising on project finance debt transactions, term loan agreements, corporate structures, exchange control regulations, corporate governance issues, labour matters, including employee incentive schemes and executive employment contracts, rendering legal opinions, and company secretarial practice. Lionel has drafted escrow service agreements and facilitated escrow transactions as ancillary services for a client’s African investment business.
Education: B.Comm Law (majoring in Economics and Business Management) and LL.B – University of Johannesburg; Short course on Mastering Power Purchase Agreements – Terrapin Training; Short course on Managing Power Sector Reform and Regulation – University of Cape Town, Graduate Business School.
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