- After a temporary setback that necessitated the implementation of loadshedding over the weekend, Eskom has suspended loadshedding as of 06:00 today due to the recovery of sufficient emergency reserves.
This past Friday, Eskom announced that it had encountered several breakdowns over the past week, necessitating extended repair times and the full use of its emergency reserves. As promised, Eskom has since replenished these reserves, with dam levels fully replenished and open-cycle gas turbines adequately recovered, ensuring a stable supply. Additionally, five coal-fired generation units have been successfully repaired and returned to service, adding a total of 2 930MW to the grid. An additional 2 391MW is expected to be restored today, Sunday, February 02, 2025.
Eskom’s Summer Outlook, published on August 26, 2024, remains unchanged.
Currently, unplanned outages stand at 13 279MW and continue to trend downward, averaging 12 087MW. Planned maintenance outages account for 6 298MW and are aligned with our summer maintenance strategy to further improve reliability in preparation for winter 2025 and beyond.
With available capacity of 27 957MW and the evening’s peak demand forecast of 24 456MW, Eskom will meet electricity demand.
The country’s Electricity and Energy Minister, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, stated that the current round of load shedding is a temporary setback and government is likely to announce the definitive end to load shedding soon.
“We are within touching distance of ending load shedding,” the minister in a briefing on Friday on the state of the system. He added that Koeberg’s unit 2 (920MW) had come back online in December and the expectation is that Kusile’s unit 6 (800MW) would be synchronised to the grid in February. Medupi’s unit 4 (764MW) would finally be brought back online by March.
Isolated network overloading
Eskom continues to face network overloading issues in certain local areas due to illegal connections, vandalism, meter tampering, unauthorised network operations, theft of network equipment, and purchasing electricity from unlicensed vendors. To prevent public safety hazards and the risk of network overloading and extended unplanned power outages, Eskom strongly urges customers to avoid illegal connections, as this can negatively impact the entire local community. It is also essential for customers to ensure they purchase electricity only from authorised vendors.
Author: Bryan Groenendaal
