Eskom expects no blackouts in winter, only Stage 2 at worst

Eskom says no loadshedding can be expected this winter if unplanned losses remain below 13,000 Megawatts. The utility’s group CEO Dan Marokane gave the state of the system winter outlook at Megawatt Park.

He says, at worst, Stage 2 will be implemented if unplanned outages reach 15,000 Megawatts.

“We were doing more maintenance deliberately to have capacity available in winter. What was troublesome for us was the confluence of high level maintenance, unplanned trips and unfortunate incidents of trips and complexity of weather that we’ve had to manage all these aspects. It will impact on our planning for summer maintenance programmes at the back of new capacity Medupi 4, Kusile 6, Koeberg coming on board,” says Marokane.

Eskom’s plans for winter power supply:

The Portfolio Committee on Electricity and Energy says it’s concerned about the recent implementation of loadshedding recently.

Committee Chairperson Nonkosi Mvana was one of the four chairpersons of the Social Services Cluster that briefed the media on their oversight, since the beginning of the 7th Parliament.

She says, however, there is an understanding on the reasons why Eskom decided to implement Stage 2 power cuts.

“Recently, we have experienced Stage 2 of loadshedding. We, as the committee, we are concerned about this backlog or backtracking. However, we are also mindful of the fact that we have ageing coal power stations that require constant maintenance. We also need more power to be connected to the grid to bring about energy and security,” she says.

Eskom’s Energy Availability Factor is currently sitting at 57%: Prof Sampson Mamphweli