BETHAL – Electricity supply to Bethal and eMzinoni is unsafe and poses a huge danger.
This issue surfaced when Ridge Times spoke to newly appointed service provider, Enpower Machite, on the latest development and challenges faced.
According to Mr Silence Sithole, a chief engineer for Enpower Machite, a network audit has been done to identify what needs to be implemented to improve electricity supply and to achieve what needs to be achieved.
“These include load balancing, what problems are leading to power outages and what other solutions need to be implemented to solve this issue,” said Mr Sithole.
“We have only hit the ground. Before we can do anything, we need to begin to understand where our issues are.”
He said one of the main issues is that the electricity demand is exceeding the supply.
“We have 26MW which is being offered by Eskom but our entire network requires much more, mainly due to the behavior of the customers,” said Mr Sithole.
He said there have been negotiations with Eskom to increase the NMD, but then GMM needs to commit to a plan of payment towards their debt that is said to be over R2-billion.
“Unfortunately, this is not a call we can make as a service provider,” said Mr Sithole.
He said they rely on the leaders of GMM.
“What they are recovering from customers is much less than what they are being billed by Eskom.”
He said future plans are to install split meters far from the customers premises which will make it difficult to bypass.
“Many meters that are inside houses are being bypassed. The majority of customers are not paying.”
Mr Sithole said their team is in place to look at ghost vendors and illegal connections.
According to Mr Sithole, some consumers and businesses are paying as little as R2 per kWh where Eskom charges a little over R4.
“All these issues will be addressed. We are coming in with a new system that will have continuous monitoring as well as accurate data capturing of all consumers.”
He said there is a lot of issues on the network site as well as a lot of equipment that is out of service and that the safety of the technical team is top priority.
Mr Sithole explained that numerous transformers have been bypassed and posses a huge danger to the technical teams working on them.
There are also no signs of previous maintenance records.
“Just one transformer fault can result in not only the customers connected to it being affected, but the whole town and township around it.
“We need to normalise our system so that if we have a fault in a specific areas, we can isolate only that specific section and not effect everyone on the ring.”
He said transformers catching fire is a huge problem, this is because the protection (fuses) have been removed in the past due to bypassing.
“We began with a healthy network, however over time transformers had been bypassed instead of replacing fuses.”
GMM is still responsible for the implemented load shedding.
“We are still not at that stage where we can operate the network.
“What we are doing now, is to bring back the standard of equipment and to make sure our operational team is as safe as possible,” said Mr Sithole.
One of Enpower Machite’s contract terms requires GMM’s electrical team to be integrated into Enpower’s team.
“At the end of our contract term, they will need to take over,” said Mr Sithole.
Mr Louis Pieterse, a technical team member for Enpower Machite, said there are a lot of exposed high voltage apparatus.
“These need to be controlled. We are in the process of putting these controls and authorisations in place,” said Mr Pieterse.
Mr Pieterse explained that an overloaded transformer could result in an explosion because nothing is protecting it.
“By normalising over a period of time, we can eliminate the possibility of these transformers exploding,” said Mr Pieterse.
He said that Enpower Machite has come very far with the network audit.
“We know where the risks are, where the hot spots are and the burning issues. Unfortunately, the network has deteriorated to such an extent that it is going to take some time to fix,” said Mr Pieterse.
Mr Sithole ended by saying consumers can correct their use of electricity by switching off geysers and non-essential appliances when not in use; specifically during peak times.
“Part of what makes our load very high is the behavior of the consumers.
“People need to pay for what they use,” concluded Mr Sithole.
“Eskom said if there is a constant payment every month they will increase the NMD,” said DA Councillor, Ms Mariaan Chamberlain.
She said R93-million which was taken out of equitable shares, was paid to Eskom.
“They took the money but said no, there needs to be a constant payment on the current account. GMM could not keep up to this agreement,” said Ms Chamberlain.
She believes that the newly appointed service provider will achieve for what they have been appointed. “It will take time.
For 25 years, under the ANC run government, there has been horrible neglect and no maintenance.
“This is not going to be a quick fix. It is going to run over five years. We need to give them time to see what change they can bring to our town,” said Ms Chamberlain.
