Latest bout of load shedding ‘not unexpected’ - energy experts

Power utility Eskom brought back the dreaded power cuts on Friday due to an increase in generation unit breakdowns that led to a loss of capacity.

This is expected to continue until 22:00, with pressure on the grid expected to continue over the weekend.

“I think that it’s likely that we may experience load shedding on Saturday and Sunday,” says energy analyst Chris Yelland.

“I don’t think it’s a complete surprise because Eskom did say they would expect three days of load shedding this winter, so today is the first of three. They said they expect these three days of load shedding with an 80 per cent probability and that leaves the door open for Eskom to say there are more days of load shedding than three days,” Yelland explains.

He says the gale force winds and cold weather in parts of the country aren’t making it any easier for the struggling power utility.

“The reason I say that is that there’s a cold front moving across South Africa and the demand for electricity may spike over the evening period.”

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Ted Blom also says Eskom woes are not unexpected.

“Eskom is fooling themselves. They’re caught between a rock and a hard place, they’re big egos are on the line,” says Blom.

“They can’t face the facts and the facts are very tight on the system and far tighter than even I anticipated and it was inevitable that sooner or later they would have system failure and we would have this bad thing called load shedding.”