Eskom planning a load shedding-free weekend – BusinessTech

Power utility Eskom says that load shedding will be suspended this weekend, with outages only expected to return on Monday evening (23 October).

The group announced a suspension in outages from 22h00 on Thursday, with the plan to keep load shedding suspended until 16h00 on Monday.

“The suspension of load shedding for more than three days is a result of the continued good generation fleet performance and the expected lower weekend demand,” it said.

Breakdowns have reduced to 12,925MW, whilst planned maintenance is at 4,889MW of generation capacity.

If realised, this would mark one of the longest streaks of no load shedding seen this year – a year that has been marred with near-permanent outages since day one.

Analysis of the data published by Eskom on its fleet performance shows that the group’s energy availability factor has taken a positive turn, with plants performing better than the same time in 2021 and 2022.

Breakdowns have also improved – which is key to the group’s plan to keep load shedding contained in the summer months.

However, the data also shows that energy supplies aren’t significantly higher, and that much of the improvement seen in the system comes from lower demand.

Improvements can also be attributed to three units at Kusile coming online in recent weeks, with units 1 and 3 returning from a year-long outage, and unit 4 returning to operation in September.

Unit 2 is expected to return in November, with unit 5 expected to be synchronized in December.

Nevertheless, whatever the source of the improvement, South Africans will welcome the reprieve.

Load shedding has, and continues to wreak havoc on the South African economy, with businesses – big and small – suffering from the extreme costs associated with trying to mitigate the outages and keep operating.

According to SARS commissioner Edward Kieswetter, the impact on taxes could be as high as R150 billion – a loss that the country can ill afford as it faces a growing budget deficit.

Read: Big turn for Eskom and load shedding in South Africa