Tight weekend power supply

[LazyLion]

Power supply on Friday and the weekend was expected to be constrained, Eskom said on Thursday.

"We are concerned about tomorrow [Friday] and into the weekend... we must warn of a possible shortfall, but we will provide updates to the public," spokesman Andrew Etzinger said.

Although the system was under strain, no load shedding was planned for Thursday, he said.

Areas currently experiencing power cuts would be due to faults at a local level and not due to Eskom's generating capacity.


Source : Sapa /gf/jk/jje
Date : 27 Nov 2014 10:46

 

[Flanders]

How does this work?

The supply is not stored is it? So then how come they can meet demand for the busiest times (ie. during the week) but then must do load shedding at the weekend? Or is the idea to take the system offline at the least busy times to do maintenance?

Either way, I don't trust these idiots. To me this smells like being held to ransom...again.

 

[daveza]

Can this be possible for Stage 2 - 4.5 hour outages ??

 

[mister]

How does this work?

The supply is not stored is it? So then how come they can meet demand for the busiest times (ie. during the week) but then must do load shedding at the weekend? Or is the idea to take the system offline at the least busy times to do maintenance?

Either way, I don't trust these idiots. To me this smells like being held to ransom...again.

They are using their hydro during the week, and pumping all the water back on weekends.

 

[Nerfherder]

How does this work?

The supply is not stored is it? So then how come they can meet demand for the busiest times (ie. during the week) but then must do load shedding at the weekend? Or is the idea to take the system offline at the least busy times to do maintenance?

Either way, I don't trust these idiots. To me this smells like being held to ransom...again.

I think you are right.

Its weekend maintenance.

 

[HavocXphere]

I think you are right.

Its weekend maintenance.

No they specifically said its to build diesel and hydro reserves for the coming week. They did the same thing last week. Its their new plan to minimize the effect on the economy.

 

[Nerfherder]

No they specifically said its to build diesel and hydro reserves for the coming week. They did the same thing last week. Its their new plan to minimize the effect on the economy.

Oh that's interesting. I wonder if the drop in the diesel price has to do with this?

 

[HavocXphere]

Oh that's interesting. I wonder if the drop in the diesel price has to do with this?

I wish.

No they're using the peaking plants (diesel turbines) and hydro pumped storage for baseload generation during the week and then trying to catch up during the weekends. Seems they have caught their diesel supplier (PetroSA) off-guard with this though...suddenly they need 12hr+ worth of diesel instead of ~2 hrs per day. By now the diesel supply should have stabilized though.

Personally I think using the diesel generators for this is a bad decision - its fixing the immediate problem but comes at a cost of much bigger problems going forward. Not only will it create an extra multi-billion hole in Eskom's finances, but it'll also chow the entire design lifespan of the turbines in record time seeing how they're being pushed way beyond what was envisioned when they were built.

 

[Sonic2k]

I wish.

No they're using the peaking plants (diesel turbines) and hydro pumped storage for baseload generation during the week and then trying to catch up during the weekends. Seems they have caught their diesel supplier (PetroSA) off-guard with this though...suddenly they need 12hr+ worth of diesel instead of ~2 hrs per day. By now the diesel supply should have stabilized though.

Personally I think using the diesel generators for this is a bad decision - its fixing the immediate problem but comes at a cost of much bigger problems going forward. Not only will it create an extra multi-billion hole in Eskom's finances, but it'll also chow the entire design lifespan of the turbines in record time seeing how they're being pushed way beyond what was envisioned when they were built.

Well, I agree with you, but, trying to explain that, or reason with, those idiots is a waste of time.
Eskom can go eat my s**t, I am running everything today, including aircons

 

[Arthur]

I think they know the effect of running the turbines 15/24. It's an indication of just how desperate things are.

 

[Creag]

...and it only gets worse as some maintenance programmes are short-cutted or not done at all.

These are dark, dark times!