Embattled power utility Eskom says load shedding will be ramped up to stage 3 and 4 this week.
Addressing the media on Sunday, chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer said that the current schedule sees load shedding moving up to stage 3 on Sunday, before moving to stage 4 on Monday.
The schedule for the week if as follows:
Sunday, 22 January
- Stage 2: until 16h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 to 00:00
Monday, 23 January
- Stage 3: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 2: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 4: 16h00 to 00h00
Tuesday, 24 January
- Stage 4: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 1: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 to 00h00
Wednesday, 25 January
- Stage 3: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 1: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 to 00h00
Thursday, 26 January
- Stage 3: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 1: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 to 00h00
Friday, 27 January
- Stage 3: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 1: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 3: 16h00 to 00h00
“Eskom is experiencing very high levels of plant unreliability and forced outages currently,” said Thomas Conradi, Eskom’s power station general manager.
“A number of large generating units are off for an extended period contributing to the high plant unavailability and loss of generating capacity.”
Total unplanned outages currently sit at 14,372MW, significantly higher than Eskom’s planning basis of 13,000MW.
Because the grid is unpredictable, things can change very quickly, but Oberholzer said that with units expected to return during the week, load shedding could be reduced to stage 2 and 3 if all goes well.
“While load shedding has been high for an extended period, there is no risk of any high load shedding at this time,” Oberholzer said, adding that there is no risk of a blackout.”
Source: My Broadband, Business Tech, Eyewitness News, image from Twitter: @DA_GPL