{"id":421920,"date":"2021-11-09T10:12:22","date_gmt":"2021-11-09T08:12:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=421920"},"modified":"2021-11-09T10:15:44","modified_gmt":"2021-11-09T08:15:44","slug":"eskom-is-falling-apart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/energy\/421920-eskom-is-falling-apart.html","title":{"rendered":"Eskom is falling apart"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eskom has no money for spares to fix power stations, breakdowns are at an all-time high, its energy availability factor (EAF) is the worst in history, and staff morale has hit rock bottom.<\/p>\n

Energy analyst Mike Rossouw said 2021 had been the worst year ever regarding Eskom\u2019s power plant availability.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis year, Eskom\u2019s energy availability factor (EAF) is around 50%. It has never been this low,\u201d Rossouw said in an ENCA interview.<\/p>\n

He highlighted that ten years ago, there was a plan to return Eskom\u2019s fleet to an 80% EAF, but this did not happen.<\/p>\n

Breakdowns continue to increase while Eskom is not hitting its planned maintenance target. It means the generation fleet is getting worse and worse.<\/p>\n

Energy expert Chris Yelland said the new power plants, which were supposed to resolve South Africa\u2019s load-shedding crisis, performed poorly.<\/p>\n

The Medupi power station has an energy availability factor of around 60%, while Kusile is even lower at around 30%.<\/p>\n

He added that one generation unit at Medupi has been destroyed in an explosion and cannot be repaired. It will take years to replace the whole unit.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese new plants are therefore performing like old plants and are not helping to increase Eskom\u2019s energy availability factor,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Damage at Medupi unit 4<\/p><\/div>\n

Another problem is that Eskom has run its emergency reserves so hard that diesel stocks are running low, and it needs to replenish its water in pump storage.<\/p>\n

The low EAF has a knock-on effect on Eskom\u2019s operations. As there is not enough electricity to meet demand, Eskom cannot take additional capacity offline for maintenance.<\/p>\n

As maintenance is not performed as needed, unplanned breakdowns increase further, and load-shedding therefore increases.<\/p>\n

Solidarity\u2019s coordinator for the electrical sector, Tommy Wedderspoon, told Moneyweb<\/strong><\/a> the breakdowns are partly a result of Eskom not having money for spares to fix power stations.<\/p>\n

\u201cStaff are trying to improvise and get permission for makeshift plans, but when the pawpaw hits the fan, management turns on them and blame them,\u201d said Wedderspoon.<\/p>\n

Wedderspoon said while Eskom increasingly blames staff for load-shedding, the company fails to provide the basics needed to function effectively. Staff morale has subsequently hit rock bottom.<\/p>\n

To make matters worse, corruption is still rife at Eskom, and the patronage networks created over the last decade are alive and well.<\/p>\n

Last week Eskom announced that two employees and a supplier were arrested<\/a><\/strong> and charged with fraud, theft, and corruption related to the disappearance of spares at Tutuka power station valued at hundreds of millions of rand.<\/p>\n

Eskom\u2019s investigations have also established the existence of a syndicate responsible for the theft of approximately R100 million worth of fuel oil per month from the power station.<\/p>\n

So dire is the situation at Eskom that Rossouw said Eskom is near a total collapse<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t see the light at the end of the tunnel. In fact, I see a big train coming down the tunnel at us,\u201d Rossouw said. \u201cWe\u2019re definitely going to have to get used to being in the dark.\u201d<\/p>\n

MyBroadband asked Eskom about the continued load-shedding and related problems, but the company did not respond.<\/p>\n

Now read: Eskom on brink of total collapse<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eskom has no money for spares to fix power stations, and its energy availability factor is the worst it has ever been.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":409132,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27995],"tags":[10034,181,35,17080,74106],"class_list":["post-421920","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-chris-yelland","tag-eskom","tag-headline","tag-mike-rossouw","tag-tommy-wedderspoon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421920"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=421920"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421920\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":421926,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421920\/revisions\/421926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=421920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=421920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=421920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}