JOHANNESBURG (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 15th March, 2021) South Africa's state-owned power provider, Eskom, announced more rolling blackouts for the rest of the week on Monday, leaving South Africans to brace for more dark nights as this trend is likely to continue until September.
Eskom executives said at a briefing that the implementation of Stage 2 load shedding will go on until 5 a.m. (03:00 GMT) on Wednesday, as the generation capacity is severely constrained.
"The power system remains vulnerable and volatile, with the risk of load shedding significantly reduced after the completion of the reliability maintenance by September 2021," Eskom COO Jan Oberholzer said.
According to Oberholzer, the unreliability of the aging fleet, with an uncertainty of about 6,000 megawatts of capacity at any given time, will remain until the reliability maintenance program can address the historical maintenance backlog.
Eskom said in a statement that breakdowns have occurred at the Tutuka, Majuba, Kusile, Matimba and Duvha power stations, adding to previous breakdowns of the Kriel and Kendel stations.
"Further to this we have had delays in units returning to service at Hendrina, Duvha and restoring full loadshedding on the Cahora Bassa line," the statement read.
Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter said that notwithstanding the current incidents of load shedding, which the company does not take lightly, the briefing comes against the backdrop of commendable performance on several aspects.
"Despite the initial challenges posed by the national COVID-19 lockdown, we have sustained the high levels of maintenance gradually increasing by between 5,500 megawatts and 7,000 megawatts, or approximately 12% of Eskom total capacity. Because of the electrostatic precipitators on certain older plants are incapable of meeting the new minimum emissions standards, a number of our generation units will have to undergo a series of upgrades," de Ruyter said.
The CEO said that the cost of bringing the aging coal fleet into full compliance with the minimum emissions standard would exceed 300 billion rand ($20 billion), which would involve Eskom retrofitting more economical and more environmentally friendly technologies on its power stations, even while ensuring that there is adequate electricity to supply the needs of the South African economy. De Ruyter pointed to fighting copper theft which costs the South African economy from 5-7 billion rand a year, and Eskom spends about 2 billion rand a year replacing stolen cables.
De Ruyter said that municipalities owed Eskom a whopping 35.2 billion rand and the utility was in continuous discussions with the government and various stakeholders to find a sustainable solution to this problem. Electricity shortfalls remain at approximately 4,000 megawatts over the next five years.
"The ultimate aim is to improve performance to reduce risk of load shedding," de Ruyter said.
