South Africans faced another round of power cuts if more pressure was put on Eskom’s grid this week, the state-owned utility said yesterday.
“So far this week, we are using our emergency reserves extensively,” spokesman Andrew Etzinger said. “We can expect that these reserves will be depleted before the end of the week, which will mean additional pressure on the grid with the increased likelihood of load shedding.”
The comment was in stark contrast with what Etzinger had said on Monday – that no power cuts were on the cards for this week.
The latest warning adds salt to Eskom’s wounds.
Last month, a coal storage silo at the Majuba power station in Mpumalanga collapsed, resulting in power outages.
Maintenance at the hydroelectric Cahora Bassa facility in Mozambique, from which Eskom draws power, has also constrained local power supply.
The power problems led the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Sacci) to warn yesterday that, although business confidence showed an improvement in November, challenges like further power outages could trigger a bout of poor confidence. The Sacci business confidence index (BCI) gained 2.0 points from 88.8 in October to 90.8 points in November.
However, a survey by Merchantec revealed that the majority of chief executives expected Eskom’s meltdown to hurt their bottom lines next year.
The Merchantec chief executives confidence index showed that 58 percent felt the lack of Eskom’s capacity would have a material effect on their business in 2015.
The remaining 42 percent were either benefiting from the business opportunity created by Eskom’s lack of capacity or were largely affected through the change in consumers’ purchasing patterns due to power shortages.
Meanwhile, calls are mounting on the government to probe the root causes of the crisis at Eskom at a time when the economy desperately needs a secure power supply.
The Cape Town Chamber of Commerce and the Intensive Energy Users Group (IEUG) joined Cosatu yesterday in calling for the government to investigate the causes of the crisis at Eskom.
Janine Myburgh, the president of the chamber, said the best way to deal with the crisis at Eskom was to appoint a full-scale judicial commission of inquiry to find out what went wrong and how to fix it.
IEUG said an investigation would reveal that the issue at Eskom was a decline in plant performance due to lack of maintenance.
“This is a direct consequence of the policy of ‘keeping the lights on’ by deferring maintenance. Eskom needs to address the lack of maintenance and the only way to address this is by taking plants off line, but this will result in further load shedding. The economy cannot afford that though.”
Meanwhile, Fin24 reported yesterday that the cabinet was expected to announce a new Eskom board next week, following revelations that it was divided over the power utility’s sponsorship of The New Age’s televised breakfast briefings, which cost Eskom R43 million. Fin24 said Ben Ngubane, a former minister and former chairman of the SABC, was tipped to take the chairmanship.