It seems unlikely that SA will exit the current round of rolling power cuts that started on September 6 before the end of this week. But Eskom is hoping to implement lower stages as it returns units to service over the next four days.
“The objective is to get back to stage 2 by the weekend,” Eric Shunmagum, senior manager for asset management at the power utility said.
Shunmagum said during a presentation to the National Energy Regulator of SA (Nersa) on Tuesday, that work was ongoing to restore the more than 20 generation units that have broken down since last week.
By Tuesday morning, Eskom was in process of recovering 8,000MW from 14 units that it hopes to restore and have back on the grid within the next four days.
That, Shunmagum said, should enable Eskom to move from stage 5 to lower levels towards the weekend.
On Monday night, total power demand in the country was sitting at about 31,000MW and Eskom had available capacity of 25,500MW.
He was speaking during the second day of public hearings being held by Nersa on Eskom’s tariff application for the next two years.
The tariff application being considered is for the 2023/2024 and 2024/2025 financial years, which forms part of Eskom’s fifth multiyear price determination (MYPD5) originally submitted in June 2021.
Eskom is asking for increases in the standard tariff of about 32% and 9.5% for the two years respectively.
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