Eskom on the brink of national blackout
It seems load shedding could be expected from next week.
ONE unexpected event at any of it power stations could see the country faced with a total failure of the national electricity grid.
This warning was issued by Eskom CEO Tshediso Matona to stakeholders on Monday this week. Added to this, says Moneyweb, the power utility has previously said it might take two weeks to restart the electricity system should a national blackout occur.
Christo van der Rheede, CEO of the Afrikaanse Handelsinstituut, who attended the meeting, told the website Matona had also warned that load shedding could be expected from next week.
At the two-hour high level meeting on Monday afternoon, Matona reportedly repeated that Eskom is not in a crisis, because the organisation is functional. “But in the next breath he said we were facing a national emergency,” Van der Rheede said. “How can you say the organisation is not in a crisis, but you cannot supply your product?”
The article goes on to quote Van der Rheede as saying Matona told delegates that the diesel budget was depleted and Eskom was hoping for money from government “but they are not collecting [from] their municipal debtors.”
According to Moneyweb, Henk van de Graaf, assistant executive manager of agricultural body TLU SA, said a calendar shown to delegates, power failures [are possible] from the middle of January, and the whole of February, March and April.
Matona reportedly told the meeting that Eskom’s interim profit of R9.3 billion will be wiped out in the second half and a mere R500 million profit is being projected for FY2014/15.
In its system bulletin sent out on Monday, Eskom forecast the following supply and demand for the week:
(Source: Eskom via Moneyweb)
To see the Eskom load shedding schedule, click here
To see the municipal load shedding schedule, click here
