After a round of overnight Stage 2 power cuts which ended at 6am on Wednesday morning, Eskom says the system remains vulnerable and there is a high likelihood of load shedding overnight.
The state power utility says it is currently using its emergency resources, including diesel, in order to replenish water supplies at its pumped storage schemes.
In the event that the company loses generation units, or unable to restore those that are currently undergoing maintenance, Eskom says it may be forced to implement load shedding earlier in the day.
Speaking in Kimberley while drumming up support for the ANC's 108th birthday celebrations on Tuesday, President Cyril Ramaphosa called on South Africans to give Eskom’s new chief executive, André de Ruyter, a chance to address the embattled utility's problems.
“The load shedding that keeps coming is because of the maintenance challenges. “Those are known problems and we are addressing them. In the end, we will need to be maintaining those power stations so that we repair them and put them on a better footing,” Ramaphosa said.
Eskom has appealed to consumers to continue using electricity sparingly to contribute towards efforts to curtail further load shedding.