Eskom Says Maintenance Extended, Load Shedding To Persist Until Next Thursday
- Stage 2 load shedding is set to continue after Eskom announced that work to replenish its emergency reserves is still being carried out
- The power cuts will be implemented every day between 9 pm to 5 am from Friday until Thursday next week
- Before Thursday, 7 October, the power utility had last implemented load shedding on 22 July
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Eskom confirmed on Friday that Stage 2 load shedding will continue until Thursday next week after initially stating that it was only expected to spill over into the weekend.
This means that South Africans should brace for power outages every day between 9 pm and 5 am.
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The power utility said work commenced to restore generating capacity to its emergency reserves will continue.
"This load shedding is also necessary to address other additional issues in the generation fleet," Eskom said in a statement.
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Before Thursday, 7 October, Eskom had last implemented load shedding on 22 July, amounting to a total of 77 days without electricity cuts for households across the country.
Additional issues exacerbating cuts
"Eskom will be working hard to return several generating units to service, and we urge the public to continue using electricity sparingly.
"Total breakdowns amount to 14 760MW while planned maintenance is 5 277MW of capacity," the statement continued.
The utility further stated that amid the process of recovering four units at its Tutuka power plant in Mpumalanga, which had experienced conveyor belt failures, the fleet suffered a cluster of boiler tube leaks in a short period.
The Kusile, Komati and Hendrina power stations have also experienced breakdowns of a generating unit each.
"The return of a generating unit at Majuba power station today provided some relief. However, this was not enough to curb the extensive use of emergency reserves," the statement concluded.
Taxpayers will suffer if Eskom fails to resolve tariff hikes dispute with Nersa
In similar news, Eskom and the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) continue to go head to head about the increase of electricity tariffs.
Nersa has recently rejected Eskom's proposal to increase tariffs in South Africa, however, the power utility says if tariffs do not go higher then taxpayers will have to cover the shortfall.
The power utility estimates that the annual shortfall will be R300 billion if Eskom is unable to charge higher fees for electricity, according to a report by MyBroadband.
General Manager of Regulations at Eskom Hasha Tlhotlha-Lemaje says Eskom made its application for tariff increases in June this year, however, Nersa rejected the application on the basis that Eskom used a methodology set to expire in March 2022 to determine new tariffs.
Source: Briefly News
