POWER CRISIS
‘Terrible start to 2024’ — nationwide rolling blackouts kick off again, signalling dark year ahead
While Eskom had a bright start to the year as a new power unit came online, an energy expert has cautioned against early celebrations. The power utility also announced rolling blackouts will make a return this week following a streak of suspensions.
On 31 December 2023, Eskom announced the successful synchronisation of Unit 5 at the Kusile Power Station Project, which was affected by a fire in October 2022.
The power utility said in a statement on Sunday that the synchronised unit will add 800MW of new capacity to help lessen rolling blackouts.
“The greatly anticipated Kusile Unit 5 brings hope to the people of South Africa as it helps power the nation and its economy. There is an enormous effort made to continue the remarkable progress on the new build programme and the Generation Recovery Plan,” said Calib Cassim, Eskom’s Acting Group Chief Executive.
Despite this, Eskom resumed load shedding on 2 January, implementing stage 2, and will escalate this to stage 3 from 5 am on Wednesday, 3 January. “This pattern of Stage 2 load shedding in the morning and Stage 3 load shedding in the evening will be repeated daily until further notice,” said Eskom in a statement.
The utility blamed the need to reintroduce the power cuts after nearly a three-week break on a setback in its planned maintenance efforts, with three generating units with a potential 2,148 megawatts (MW) capacity not coming back online as anticipated. In addition, the utility recently experienced the unplanned losses of six generating units with a combined capacity of 3,113MW.
“Unplanned outages are currently at 16,231MW of generating capacity, while the capacity out of service for planned maintenance is 8,451MW”.
Low demand and even lower supply available
Energy analyst and managing director of EE Business Intelligence, Chris Yelland, said this resumption of rolling blackouts came as a surprise to many, including himself.
“Demand for electricity at the moment is still very low, and will only return to normal around the middle of January,” he said.
“Although electricity demand is very low, supply of electricity is even lower”.
Yelland said that over 24,000MW out of service is a record for South Africa. “We have never experienced outages at that level in the past and it sets a new record in South Africa as far as I am aware,” he said.
Unplanned outages of 16,000MW are a return to some of the worst periods of 2023, while the planned outages are at a very high level currently, said Yelland.
“The high levels of unplanned breakdowns, as well as the high levels of planned maintenance, was such that even with reduced demand for electricity over this period, we were pushed into load shedding,” he said.
‘A very bad start to the year’
Yelland said this was ‘a very bad start to the year’, particularly coming as it did, only a day after Eskom announced the successful synchronisation of Unit 5 at the Kusile Power Station Project.
Unit 5 was nine years behind schedule and should have been synchronised to the grid long ago, according to Yelland.
Yelland said that while it was an important milestone and a good news story, the public should not expect the unit to make any significant contribution to the grid right now.
“It is only starting the commissioning process, and it starts from a very low level of power output,” said Yelland.
“Slowly over weeks and months, it ramps up to full load as they do in the commissioning. They will be switching the unit on and off all the time, sorting out all kinds of problems and it will only be handed over for commercial use in six months”.
Kusile and Medupi to blame for financial difficulties at Eskom
Construction of Unit 6 is still under way and once all six units are in operation, Kusile will be able to generate 4,800MW.
Yelland said Unit 6 was running eight years late and that much of Eskom’s financial difficulties were the direct result of cost and time overruns at Medupi and Kusile.
“Not only has it brought Eskom to its very knees, it has seriously damaged the South African economy. This load shedding that we’ve experienced for several years now is a direct consequence of the lateness of Medupi and Kusile and the poor construction performance of these power plants,” he said.
Kusile Power Station on 11 Septemeber, 2023. (Photo: Felix Dlangamandla)
The power utility said intensified efforts were also being made to return Medupi Unit 4 to service by the end of July 2024. Yelland said although it might not take as long as six months to commission this unit, there could still be challenges.
“Restarting a unit that has been out of service for three years is not a trivial matter and there may be significant work that is required,” he said.
Yelland anticipates that it could take a month to sort out the issues and return it to service because they are replacing the entire generator — as the original generator was completely written off due to an explosion in 2021.
“It is a second-hand generator they are installing and that comes with its own problems. It was not the generator originally intended for this power station, so there will be some extra work in adapting this second-hand generator to fit the existing installation, which was never designed for this particular generator,” said Yelland.
Eskom appeals against rolling blackouts exemption order
On Friday, 1 December, the Gauteng Division of the High Court in Pretoria handed down a judgment in a case brought by opposition parties in which three judges found that the government was responsible for rolling blackouts, and the numerous failures that led to it.
It also ruled that the government (in the form of Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa) must take steps to stop the interruption of power to public health facilities, police stations, and schools by the end of January.
ActionSA, which was an applicant in the matter, criticised Eskom’s application for leave to appeal against the ruling.
“Eskom, the President, and the Minister of Electricity specifically want to appeal sections of the ruling which ruled in favour of ActionSA’s request that hospitals, schools, and police stations be exempted from experiencing rolling blackouts and allege that the judgment is too vague,” read the statement.
The power utility argued the judgment was too vague, and its orders were either unlawful, dangerous, or impossible to implement.
Yelland said the timeline given in the judgment presented a major problem.
“I just don’t think it can be done in that time. There are also some practical implications, procurement implications, and some issues in the distribution network that make it difficult to carry out what the judge ordered,” he said.
The year ahead
Yelland said the availability of Eskom’s fleet at the moment had been declining every year, and declined significantly in 2023.
“Under an optimistic scenario, I hope that the energy availability factor will not go down further but will stay at the same very poor levels of 2023,” he said.
Rolling blackouts would be at much higher stages were it not for the typically lower demand in December and early January, said Yelland.
“I do think we’re going to have further load shedding in 2024, but I hope at least it will stabilise and not get worse,” he said. DM
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Any of you that worked through the season knows that almost everybody else is still closed.
And we are at stage 3 evenings.
Next week is stage 4 daytime stage 6 evenings.
BRING YOUR OWN POWER OR BE DAMNED
Expected nothing less from the Anc goverment,they cant fix anything
Because they break everything.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, shame on both of us.
The barefaced lies uttered daily by these ineffectual no-marks demonstrate a poignant truism – when you lie you tell yourself the truth, and that truth is that you are weak. Sputla and his cronies must return their handsome salaries and report in their designer gear to the closest pillories for a well deserved taste of rotten cabbages. What an absolute shambles.
These decisions all comes from Ramaphosa, he the all powerful, the elephant slayer, beating his chest as he turns his aircon higher
You forgot couch stuffer.
World Cup snatcher
Spot on Cachunk! You omitted the other equally anc DNA – they also STEAL everything!!!!
Pee pool get the government they deserve.
This is exactly the problem. SA doesn’t have an ANC problem. The country has a voter problem, in terms of which millions persist in voting for parties like the ANC and EFF. These voters deserve every bit of their misery; unemployment, sitting in the dark and poverty. They vote for it every time, after all.
It’s not much different here in the USA with Biden voters.
It is obvious .. you would prefer the psychopath Trump … the lying and disgraceful moron who can’t even get the orange goo covering his face to cover the areas around his eyes … making him look like an albino … on a retired president’s salary to boot !
Exactly , in 72 , only 18 , saw stuff 🙂
Yet most stuff worked .
So why are they voting for more of the same , do not get it .
So I ask, general feeling was , parents are ANC , if I vote otherwise I will disgrace them , or cannot be bothered !
So no longer do I feel sorry for the masses , their choice !
Who will pay for their electricity , when those that can go off grid ?
Munis are suffering already .
Medupi / Kusile , could not break even if all units were running . When will unit 6 be complete ?
Can only hope the masses arise and vote out the ANC !
Not unexpected , what really gets me is municipalities now invading private residences and destroying solar electricity systems . As I have found over a two and a half year battle municipalities are protected by government and are therefore untouchable regardless of incompetence or criminality of their actions.
Steven, the only thing they can legally do is force an owner of a system in breach of safety regulations to disable the system. Which is fair, the safety rules are generally sane. If you have experience of council entering a property and destroying a system you should get the story to the media and a lawyer.
There are two main angles to the rules. One is the physical safety in terms of system must have the right cables, protection etc – no different than if you added a piece to house the plugs and lights must be installed correctly. The second element is a council can prohibit interconnection of your generation equipment and their distribution network. That you can overcome by having the battery as isolation between your solar powered stuff and them. They cannot in any law I’ve heard of say anything about solar power that is remote from their network.
Agreed — @Steven Devilliers, if you truly have evidence of this, turn it over to DM or News24. On a related note, I would certainly not allow any muni employee on my property without valid ID and the appropriate paper work, never mind what they want to do.
If OTOH the installations are illegal as in not within safety regulations or unauthorized … well then you’re on your own. But even then they cannot “destroy” them, they can only make you disconnect from the grid
Steven, please be more specific. Which municipalities? Possibly name a couple of the private residences concerned? This sounds like an urban legend. Johan Buys has summed in up correctly. PS: A fair number of hoops to jump through to get two full soalr pv-inverter-battery systems set up in Cape Town, but our Municipality and their officials are approachable, and comunicate very well.
Our municipality requires us to notify them if we install an ‘alternate power generation system’. They assess what you tell them and decide whether they need to coem and inspect to satify themselves that you cannot energise their supply system. This, coupled with the letter I got from my insurer requiring surge arrestors, got me to do just that, while attaching a certificate of compliance certificate from a locally registered electrician that it had been done correctly and would not pose a risk to persons working on the network. To me it is sensible to do this.
Didn’t Mbalula promise that there would be no loadshedding at year end? As I gaze out of my window on holiday, I find myself wondering idly how many billions of Rands worth of diesel was burned between 16 and 31 Dec to make this foolish statement come true.
The ANC will sacrifice the economy to keep its ridiculous promises in an attempt to maintain their electoral position. We’ll all suffer in the end.
If Mbabullshitter says one thing, you can guarantee the opposite will happen
DM moderators, please delete this spam and block the user from posting more of the same.
Not only Mr Fix Fokkol. In April last year, that other pinnacle of windbaggery, ineptitude, and ineptitude, Electricity M̶i̶n̶i̶s̶t̶e̶r̶ Buffoon Ramokgopa, gibbered much the same BS, yet here we are with load-shirking in full flight.
It’s the same old story CORRUPTION MALFEASANCE etc they all need to be brought to account and then ORANGE and throw the KEYS away then only will we see some improvement
And starting a very large coal fired unit, is meant to be a good thing?
Incredible, after all the talk at Cop28, and S Africa weeping and wailing with the rest of them — more coal is being burnt now than ever before in history.
And S Africa and its best mate (after Russia) China are very responsible.
Buy houses on high ground, and dig very deep for water people.
You can bet the farm that load shedding will cease at least one month before the elections, during which time our gorgeous government will be telling the populace that they have resolved the power issue and load shedding is finished. Load shedding will of course resume the day after the election has been held…..
“The greatly anticipated Kusile Unit 5 brings hope to the people of South Africa as it helps power the nation and its economy. There is an enormous effort made to continue the remarkable progress on the new build programme and the Generation Recovery Plan,” said Calib Cassim, Eskom’s Acting Group Chief Executive.”
The tragedy is that this person has been parachuted into his acting position and actually believes the drivel he spouts!
The new build programme is billions over budget and years behind schedule.
The 4 disabled units at Kusile (5 and 1-3) and Unit 4 at Medupi were all due to human (operational and testing) errors. Brand new or low-hour equipment. Total 4500Mw or over 4 stages of load shedding.
All they are doing is fixing their mistakes(K1-3 on interim and polluting basis-M4 with an incompatible generator).
(As writer suggested at the time K5 or as yet uncommissioned K6 generator should have been relocated to M4 as they are the same. A major exercise but nothing that has not been done before in 6-9 months.
Would have avoided 1 stage of LS for the past 4 years. The cost/benefit was a no-brainer!)
That ignores the deplorable state of the other plants.
Despite the well intentioned and ultimately correct naysayers, the only immediate and quickest way to restore a stable and adequate base-load power supply for the nation is from the coal plants.
Until Eskom can overcome the governing party’s idealistic economic and employment policies-this can never happen.