Electricity minister Ramokgopa reveals loadshedding stages for winter

Eskom has forecast a bit of good news for South Africans regarding load shedding this coming winter as a worst-case scenario would leave the country at stage 5 loadshedding.

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Eskom CEO, Dan Marokane, briefed the media on the power utility’s winter plan starting from the end of April until the end of August.  Marokane revealed that Eskom has been paying far less on diesel, down 50% compared to the same time last year. He said that, on current projections, loadshedding would be limited to stage 2 ‘at most’ but a worst-case scenario would be stage 5, The Citizen reported.

‘In the extreme case, where the unreliability increases, that component may go occasionally to stage 5 but we really think that on the basis of what we see and the performance of the fleet, load shedding will stay within stage 2 from our planning perspective,’ the Eskom CEO explained.

He said stage 2 would see 50 days of loadshedding, R8.8 billion spent on diesel and 15 500 megawatts (MW) of unplanned maintenance, while stage 5 would see 103 days of loadshedding, with R16 billion spent on diesel and 17 000 MW of unplanned maintenance.

Marokane said unplanned load losses would be a focus area for Eskom during the winter season, where electricity demand tends to increase.

According to Eskom board chairperson, Mteto Nyati, the Energy Action Plan has thus far yielded positive results, even though the energy availability factor (EAF) target of 65% by the end of April wasn’t met. The EAF currently stands at 61%. Nyati also said that this goal was in line with Eskom’s performance plan.

Electricity Minister, Kgotsietsho Ramokgopa, has attributed Eskom’s improvements to better planned maintenance as the power utility implemented a better plan to manage load shedding. He said that, while SA was not rid of load shedding in its entirety, significant strides have been made. He also dismissed claims by opposition parties that load shedding would return after elections.

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Picture: Daniel Reche / Pexels
Originally written by: Matthew Peterson for African Insider

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