Eskom To Add 2,550 MW to the Grid for the Cold Week, South Africans Predict Loadshedding

• State-owned enterprise Eskom has announced that it is planning on adding at least 2,550 megawatt hours of power to the grid in preparation for the cold week
• The South African Weather Service announced that the country is expected to experience severely cold weather in most of the provinces
• While the power utility is aiming to keep the lights on, South Africans believe that there will be loadshedding in winter

With 10 years of experience, Tebogo Mokwena, a Briefly News current affairs journalist, has provided insights into infrastructure challenges and state-owned enterprises in South Africa, having worked at Daily Sun and Vutivi Business News.

JOHANNESBURG — Eskom has announced that it will add 2,550 MW of power to the grid to keep the lights on during the upcomong cold week. The announcement came after the South African Weather Service predicted that the country would experience snow in the coming days.

Eskom to add more power to grid

The state-owned enterprise posted on its @Eskom_SA X account on 6 June 2205. Eskom said that it has an adequate emergency reserve in place to support the demand during peak periods in the mornings and evenings. It added that he system occasionally experiences strain but is making progress as it moves past the peak maintenance season.

A look at outages in 2025

Eskom noted that the country will not experience loadshedding if unplanned outages remain below 13,000MW. However, an increase of outages to 15,000MW would result in Stage 2 loadshedding for 21 days. The SOE pointed out that unplanned outages between 30 May and 5 June cost the utility 14,644MW. It lost 13,760MW in unplanned outages for the current financial year.

Unplanned outages amount to 13,855 MW, and the available generation capacity is 28,875 MW. Eskom also called on members of the community to avoid illegal connections. These cause transformer overloads, equipment failures, and explosions. It also called on South Africans to report cable theft.

Read the X statement here:

What you need to know about loadshedding

• Eskom implemented Stage 3 loadshedding on 7 March 2025, which lasted for three days, much to the irritation of South Africans
• The state-owned enterprise implemented Stage 2 loadshedding on 24 April, and many believed that the loadshedding was a punishment for the scrapping of the VAT increase
• Despite the loadshedding, the electricity Minister, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, said that the country would not have loadshedding in winter
• Notheless, Eskom implemented Stage 2 loashedding on 13 May and South Africans joked abo[ut the power outage
• Ramokgopa said that the power utility is fighting to keep the lights on, and South Africans accused him of not keeping the promise he made of no loadshedding

What did South Africans say?

Netizens commenting on X were not convinced that Eskom could keep the lights on during winter.

T-Junction said:

"Jiki jiki loadshedding Stage 6."

PNomazaza78 said:

"As soon as I see a post like this I know by morning it will be stage something."

MoAfrika Borwa said:

"Soft-launching loadshedding. Y'all think we were born last night."

Brandon said:

"You're going to hit us with loadshedding. You'll be telling us of breakdowns next week."

Thsbiso Kgabung said:

"Guys, just announce and get it over with. I don't mind. I have books to catch up on anyway."

Eskom blames generation unit loss for Stage 2 loadshedding

In a related article, Briefly News reported that Eskom implemented Stage 2 loadhedding on 20 March. It stated that the power outages were caused by the loss of generation units.

Five generations lost generative power before the peak period. Spokesperson Daphne Mokoena said that the SOE prioritized planned maintenance to strengthen system reliability.

Source: Briefly News