Cape Town - Energy expert Lungile Mashele says if issues facing Eskom are not resolved before the cold snap hits, higher stages of load shedding are almost certain during winter.
Mashele said the winter outlook is bleak, and naturally we can expect high load shedding stages everyday.
Eskom announced Stage 6 load shedding on Wednesday, having announced Stage 5 blackouts on Tuesday.
“This weekend demand fluctuated between 21GW and 27GW. This is why during the day Eskom was able to suspend load shedding.
“The challenge was the evening peak. By Monday evening, signs were already there of a difficult week when demand reached a maximum of 27GW.
“Eskom relied on diesel and more significantly on ILS and VPS (interruptible load shedding and virtual power stations) from large customers. This is very worrying for a pre-winter period,” Mashele said.
Mashele said winter load shedding stages would likely fluctuate between Stage 4 and 6.
She said the real challenge is further plant breakdowns because of an unreliable coal fleet leading to insufficient supply.
“Eskom needs to hold an urgent system briefing on what the winter plan is.
“They need to give updates on the maintenance carried out and fleet availability.
“They need to provide an update on how far they are with the public participation process on Kusile - 21 00MW.
“They need to provide an update on how far they are in procuring the additional 1000MW from the region," she says.
Mashele says Eskom needs to give an update on the Koeberg outage. If none of these issues are resolved before the cold snap hits then higher stages of load shedding are almost certain.
IOL