Eskom problems this winter
A quarter of the country’s power generation capacity is out of order – either for scheduled maintenance or due to “unplanned outages” – according to an article by City Press.
The newspaper combined the 240 system update bulletins released by Eskom since their issuing began in 2012, finding that in 2014 alone an average of 10,341 megawatts have been offline – roughly 25% of the system.
By May last year, this number was 9,745MW, and in 2012 it was 8,974MW.
“The apparently good news is that, despite the catastrophic wet coal incident at the Kendal power station in March and the subsequent “pressurisation incident” that took out a unit of the Duvha power station, “unplanned outages”– or breakdowns – are significantly lower this year,” the article stated.
Energy expert Chris Yelland said the drop in break downs was due to Eskom’s improved maintenance campaign that began last year, but he maintained that the power utility is yet to get a handle on the problem of unplanned outages.
“So far this year, unplanned outages are taking out on average 4,882MW and go up to 6,000MW often, most recently this Monday,” the article read.
According to Yelland, the fact that unplanned outages still spike to 6 000MW is “a very bad sign”.
Yelland’s sentiments follow those of energy analyst Andrew Kenny, who last week predicted that Eskom would face “big problems” this winter.
“Not to say that we will have a shortage, but in the event that we did, it would be a (brief) period of shortage rather than a long period throughout the day as in summer,” said Kenny.
“But the main thing is – Eskom says, listen, don’t invest in any industry that is going to use a lot of electricity, because it won’t be able to provide it.”
Yelland added that part of the problem was that the Medupi power station, which should have been operating by now. It could significantly lessen the shorfall by providing 3,600MW to the grid, he said.
Eskom previously said: “The power system remains tight and is vulnerable to any changes going into winter, and will remain so for the next few years until the build programme is completed.”
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