Cape Town - As Eskom faces breakdowns at several power stations, coal supply constraints, and the negative impact of heavy rain at its plants, Eskom CEO André de Ruyter this week gave the assurance that at this point in time there was no risk of the country going beyond Stage 8 load shedding.
De Ruyter said there were contingency plans in place for Stage 8 should there be further losses in generation capacity, as experts relayed what may have been the closest brush with Stage 8 since load shedding first began.
Energy experts have calculated that Eskom has had to postpone or cancel some of its planned maintenance at short notice to avoid Stage 8 load shedding this week, when the combination of increasing plant breakdowns and other factors exacerbated the implementation of Stage 6 blackouts.
While Stage 6 is expected to end tonight, and ease to Stages 4 and 3, Eskom emphasised the precarious situation and said there was a possibility of load shedding worsening at short notice.
Monique le Roux, a senior energy researcher at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research said: “Eskom originally planned to have around 5 600MW of generation out on planned maintenance, but in their media release on Sunday night (announcing the continuation of Stage 6), they said only 3566MW was currently out on planned maintenance. This means around 2 000MW of planned maintenance was cancelled or postponed at short notice.”
When questioned, Eskom’s head of generation, Thomas Conradie, said there were plans for higher maintenance, but when they realised Kusile units were not returning to operation sooner, things were “optimised”. He confirmed if more maintenance was done, there would have been higher load shedding (Stage 8).
Le Roux added: “There are lots of variables that could influence which load shedding stages are necessary – for example, how much diesel they have to burn, the contribution from renewables, and how much unplanned and planned maintenance there is – but it is definitely possible we could see Stage 8 before winter, although this would probably be Eskom’s absolute worst-case scenario.”
South Africa is currently curtailing electricity demand by 7,000MW to keep the grid stable.
— Nick Hedley (@nickhedley) February 22, 2023
We’re unofficially on stage 7 load shedding.
Independent energy expert Hilton Trollip agreed that Stage 8 was a distinct possibility this winter. He said the situation this week illustrated that the country was already on the brink of Stage 8, as it was sitting with a highly unpredictable, highly unreliable fleet of power stations that had been hammered over the years.
De Ruyter said the reason load shedding was used in the first instance was to allow Eskom to maintain a 50Hz frequency on the grid. If this frequency was lost because of a shortage of generation capacity, a total grid collapse would occur, which would take anything from 10 to 15 days to resolve.
“We do have contingency plans in place should there be a loss in generation capacity… I don’t want to elaborate too much on that, but can give the country the assurance that we are doing everything in our power to ensure we do not end up in a situation where we go beyond that (Stage 8),” De Ruyter said.
Should Stage 8 be implemented, South Africans would experience electricity blackouts for 12 to 14 hours a day, which would have devastating effects on all sectors of society.
Cape Town’s mayor, Geordin Hill-Lewis, said Stage 6 had already placed critical infrastructure – from electricity assets and water and sanitation plants and facilities to communications towers – under severe threat.
However, if Stage 8 were implemented, these threats would increase in severity and extend to substations, circuit-breakers, wastewater treatment plants, water pumps, cellphone towers, and other infrastructure.
Evening Peak Feedback 21/02/2023, 19:15
— SikonathiMantshantsh (@SikonathiM) February 21, 2023
Total demand: 30 480MW
Loadshedding: 7 045MW
Eskom OCGT's Utilised: 14
Eskom GT’s Utilised: 3
IPP OCGT's: 5
Renewable Gen: 1 262MW (Wind 791MW, CSP 390MW, PV 81MW)@Eskom_SA Available Generation: 23 289MW@EskomSpokesper1