The Minister in the Presidency responsible for electricity, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa said that his department has achieved a 56% aggregate with regards to completion of objectives set out in the Energy Action Plan (EAP) announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa in July last year.
Ramokgopa was speaking during a media briefing on Sunday about the EAP’s progress.
According to a progress report by Ramokgopa, 50 objectives or actions were set out in the EAP.
So far, eight actions are completed and 20 are on track.
12 objectives are delayed, eight are off track and two have not yet started.
The National Energy Crisis Committee (NECOM) was established to oversee the implementation of this EAP.
The five objectives are fixing Eskom, enabling and accelerating private investment into generation of electricity, accelerating procurement of new capacity from renewable energy, promoting solar power for business and personal use and gearing the energy sector for long term sustainability.
Minister Ramokgopa said that the National Treasury has approved a R254 billion bailout for Eskom alongside debt relief for municipalities.
“This is a critical step to enable Eskom to invest in necessary maintenance as well as expansion of the transmission network,” the Minister’s report read.
Ramokgopa said the briefing was important because it marked a year since the announcement of the EAP.
“I did make the point earlier that what we are trying to do is measure our performance over a period of time so we can see whether we are able to sustain this performance in relation to the baseline.
“For me this is a more telling picture, because it indicates whether or not the actions we are implementing are giving us the results that are desired over a period of time,” Ramokgopa said.
When looking at capacity available, the May 2023 baseline was 27,410 Megawatts, while the July average was 28,579 MW.
Over the last five days, the average capacity available was 29,277 MW.
Ramokgopa said another indicator that was important to look at was the unplanned capacity loss factor, which was brought down by around 2,000 MW since May.
The continued work at restoring and maintaining units will afford Eskom to undermine the unplanned capacity loss factor even further, the minister added.
“This will allow us to have firm control of the grid and not be at the mercy of those units that fail from time to time,” Ramokgopa said.
“I think it was important to take you over some of the work we’ve done for the last 12 months. It is important because there is a need for us to be transparent, there is a need for us to be accountable.
“It’s one thing for the President to unveil the Energy Action Plan, it's quite another to report against the targets of it. We want to normalize this type of thing to ensure we remain accountable,” Ramokgopa said.
The Minister said the highlight of the week was Unit 2 at Grootvlei Power Station in Mpumalanga coming back online after it sustained fire damages last month.
IOL