Cape Town - While the rest of SA will stay on Stage 2 load shedding from 5pm this evening, the City of Cape Town announced that its customers will alternate between Stage 0, Stage 1 and Stage 2.
Power utility Eskom on Tuesday announced it would be implementing Stage 2 load shedding from 5pm until 5am on Wednesday after it had suspended load shedding early on Tuesday morning.
Eskom said this was due to the continued shortage of generation capacity.
“Eskom regrets to inform the public that Stage 2 load shedding will again be implemented from 5pm this evening,” it said.
Meanwhile, the City of Cape Town announced its schedule which sees its customers alternate between a couple of stages.
The City said that there would be no load shedding for customers from 5pm until 6pm. Thereafter, Stage 1 load shedding would be in effect from 6pm until 8pm.
Between 8pm and 10pm, there would again be no load shedding for the City customers, but from 10pm afterwards, residents would be on Stage 2 until 5am on Wednesday morning.
Update #2
— City of Cape Town (@CityofCT) April 12, 2022
Eskom's load-shedding Stage 2 from 17:00 today.
City customers 12 and 13 April
Stage 0: 17:00 - 18:00 (no load-shedding for City customers)
Stage 1: 18:00 - 20:00
Stage 0: 20:00 - 22:00 (no load-shedding for City customers)
Stage 2: 22:00 - 05:00 13 April#CTInfo pic.twitter.com/pPS2j6sahJ
The utility also asked South Africans to brace themselves for possible load shedding throughout the week.
“Eskom would like to inform the public that this constrained supply situation will persist throughout the week, with the possibility that more load shedding is likely to be implemented should the generation capacity deteriorate further,” it said.
Eskom CEO André de Ruyter further warned that flooding in KwaZulu-Natal continues to ravage critical infrastructure affecting the country.
Addressing the media earlier, De Ruyter said things were “very dynamic” as they were dealing with an emergency situation in KwaZulu-Natal.
At least 20 people have lost their lives, and scores more are missing as heavy rains continue to lash KwaZulu-Natal.
De Ruyter said that in a number of instances, Eskom has to wait for the flood waters to subside before their teams can assess and start restoring supply of electricity.
“We have to also be extremely careful with our staff and ensure that water and electricity do not mix.
“As floods are still in process, we are trying to do damage assessment and see how we can restore power as soon as possible but bearing in mind that safety of our crew and customers are of paramount importance,” De Ruyter said.
He said the heavy rain contributed to the Eskom challenges as significant debris has flowed into the turbines in Drakensberg.
READ MORE: KZN flood adds pressure to Eskom’s woes, load shedding expected to continue this week