Eskom CEO on the load shedding outlook for South Africa
Eskom says that the risk of continued load shedding up until the end of March 2022 remains high.
In a media briefing on Wednesday (2 February), chief executive Andre de Ruyter said stage 2 load shedding is set to last until 05h00 on Monday, but it may be that the system will improve and there is a successful return of service before then if systems are returned in time.
He added that load shedding will not be lifted earlier if emergency power reserves are not restored before the end of the weekend.
While it is impossible to tell if there will be another five or ten days of load shedding, he noted that South Africa typically sees more power outages in summer due to the high ambient temperatures and more rain which can impact coal supplies.
“We have to get through this period now during the summer months where we have lower availability due to planned outages and additional stress on systems due to higher ambient temperatures.”
This was echoed by chief operating office Jan Oberholzer who said that if there is another bad patch, like Eskom experienced in the last five to six days, then the risk of load shedding will be high.
The return of load shedding
De Ruyter said a combination of factors in the last week led to the return of load shedding and power outages.
Notably, the increase in international diesel prices means supplies in the country have decreased, and the country has fewer emergency reserves to rely on. The power utility is now relying on load shedding to replenish these reserves to create a buffer and avoid a total blackout, he said.
He added that the country relies on load shedding to maintain the existing power grid and that a total blackout would lead to a catastrophic loss of power and no electricity for two to three weeks.
De Ruyter said that Eskom is also performing a number of necessary repairs – including the Koeberg nuclear power station in the Western Cape – which has led to reduced generating capacity.
The power utility is also battling a number of unforeseen breakages, including:
- 4,435MW planned maintenance;
- 8,093MW of unplanned load losses;
- 5,368MW of total load losses;
- Combined, this has led to a total of 13,461MW of capacity being unavailable due to unplanned outages.
De Ruyter said that Eskom was now working hard to bring units back as quickly as possible
“We are hoping to reduce the extent of load shedding as much as we can, but in this instance, we, unfortunately, had no choice but to implement (stage 2 load shedding).”
Oberholzer added that Eskom has seen a significant amount of breakdowns since Friday afternoon, leading to the loss of some 4,000MW of capacity.
This meant that Eskom had to burn through emergency power reserves over the weekend and now needs time to recover, he said.
Stage 2 load shedding until Monday
Eskom announced that it will introduce stage 2 load shedding on Wednesday due to ongoing power constraints.
Following further breakdowns during the night, load shedding will begin at 11h00 on Wednesday until 05h00 on Monday (7 February), it said.
“This load shedding is necessary due to a shortage of generation capacity following breakdowns of two more generating units during the night.
“Since the weekend Eskom has utilised significant amounts of emergency generating reserves, which have now been depleted and need to be replenished. Eskom will use this period to replenish the emergency generation reserves,” it said.
For people living in the major metros, load shedding schedules are available here:
For access to other load shedding schedules, Eskom has made them available on loadshedding.eskom.co.za.
Smartphone users can also download the app EskomSePush to receive push notifications when load shedding is implemented, as well as the times the area you are in will be off.
Read: Eskom moves to stage 2 load shedding – here is the schedule