Page 12 - AfrElec Week 19 2022

AfrElec POLICY AfrElec

South Africa power

cuts seen rising to

new level in 2022

SOUTH AFRICA SOUTH Africa is headed for a record year of moving the country away from coal.
power cuts if the rate of station breakdowns As the southern hemisphere winter begins,
continues as is the case now, particularly at coal- Eskom has announced a plan to cut supplies over
fuelled plants, according to Bloomberg. the evening peak from 5pm to 10pm daily.
State-owned Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. said The utility said in a release cited by Money-
it would again ration electricity on Tuesday web, a local publication, that winter demand for
(May 10) after various generation units were electricity has increased, placing further strain
shut down for repairs or didn’t return to service on a grid already strained by breakdowns and
as expected. plants that take long to service.
That means that nationwide cuts in supplies The failure of a unit each at three power sta-
will have occurred on seven of the 10 days in tions on Monday afternoon, as well as the delay
May so far, according to data compiled by the in returning several other generation units to the
news agency. grid at five facilities, had added stress to the sys-
Africa’s most-industrialised nation was tem and necessitated the implementation of the
already on track to exceed the annual record for power cuts.
energy shed from controlled blackouts, a prac- “The onset of winter has seen increased
tice locally known as load-shedding that is used demand, and this will lead to a constrained
to prevent the grid from a total collapse. system, particularly during the morning and
There were 1,054 gigawatt hours cut through evening peaks, throughout the winter,” Money-
April, versus 2,521 in the whole of 2021, which web reported, citing an Eskom release.
was a record, according to the state-owned “We therefore urge all South Africans to
Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. continue using electricity sparingly, especially
The crisis at Eskom, which generates almost between 05h00 – 09h00 in the mornings and
all the nation’s electricity, including 80% from 16h00 – 22h00 in the evenings.”
burning coal, causes disruption to both daily life On that day, the utility had 3,049MW of
in South Africa and economic activity. capacity out on planned maintenance while
The ongoing outages, says Bloomberg, have another 15,943MW had been lost from the grid
increased pressure on Chief Executive Officer due to unplanned breakdowns. The country has
Andre de Ruyter. Beyond the operational issues, an installed capacity of 46,000MW.
the utility has a $26bn debt and is undergoing a As outages continue, Eskom, during the
reorganisation. Phillip Dukashe, an executive in evening peak last week, utilised its diesel-burn-
charge of generation, quit on Monday after 26 ing open cycle gas turbines for 23 hours daily,
years at the company, citing the need to balance spending about ZAR800,000 ($50,000) per hour,
family time and his health. according to a Moneyweb estimate. Peaking
Eskom and the government are also working plants owned by independent power producers
on plans to utilise $8.5bn of funding pledged also ran for as many hours on diesel to feed the
at the COP26 climate summit with the aim of grid.™

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 19 12•May•2022