Eskom to take Koeberg Unit 2 off the grid for a month
With the Covid-19 national lockdown in full effect, Eskom has experienced a significant reduction in demand for electricity
Eskom will take Koeberg Unit 2 off the grid for a month to do maintenance at midnight on April 3.
With the lower demand for electricity during the current lockdown, Eskom has decided to step up its maintenance.
Some other units have already been taken offline and Koeberg Unit 2 will now be added to the list.
Eskom assured customers the units can return to service at short notice should the need arise.
Koeberg Unit 2 is scheduled to return to service by April 30.
As part of protecting the integrity of the power system, Eskom has also issued force majeure notices to wind independent power producers.
These notices serve to alert the wind IPPs of the possibility that Eskom may, from time to time, curtail their supply to the grid during the national lockdown.
Should this remote possibility happen, the IPPs will be afforded one day of relief for every day, or part thereof, of lost production. This will ensure none of the wind IPPs will be worse off than before the force majeure.
With the Covid-19 national lockdown in full effect, Eskom has experienced a significant reduction in demand for electricity. Usage has dropped by between 7 500MW and 9 000MW since the lockdown came into effect last week.
This has allowed Eskom to operate without the need to implement load-shedding.
Eskom is making use of this opportunity to carry out important short-term maintenance of the generation infrastructure.
