Home News Eskom recovers units but says load shedding will continue

Eskom recovers units but says load shedding will continue

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File image: ANA

ESKOM has said it will implement Stage 1 load shedding on Wednesday despite returning generation units at Medupi and Majuba power stations to service.

“This additional capacity has significantly reduced the strain on the generation system,” the power utility said in a statement early on Tuesday evening, adding that it had also synchronised units at the Koeberg nuclear power station back onto the national grid.

“The progress, however, is still not sufficient to enable us to suspend this current unfortunate period of load shedding,” it said.

The system in part has remained constrained because the return to service of units at Kendal and Tutuka power stations has been delayed.

Load shedding will be implemented from 9am to 10pm on Wednesday.

The troubled utility, plagued by debt, maintenance backlogs and design faults at new power plants, managed to avoid load shedding for more than three months after South Africa went into a nationwide lockdown in response to the Covid-19 health crisis.

But it again began implementing scheduled blackouts last week after suffering a high number of plant breakdowns a few weeks after government eased lockdown restrictions to allow the economy to reopen and people to return to work.

Eskom said technical teams were working overtime to restore as many generation units as possible.

It said that cold winter weather over much of the country has driven up demand and it called on consumers to use electricity sparingly.

“We therefore urge the public to continue assisting us in managing consumption in order to reduce the impact of the supply constraints.”

– African News Agency (ANA)

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