MMC says goodbye to power-cuts
Cllr Dagada announced after a day-long tour of City Power’s facilities and infrastructure in various parts of Johannesburg.
JOHANNESBURG residents and business owners should rest assured that there will be no power outages or shortages in the city over the next 10 years or so, member of the mayoral committee (MMC) for finance, Clr Rabelani Dagada, announced on Tuesday, November 29. That was after a day-long tour of City Power’s facilities and infrastructure in various parts of Johannesburg.
The tour was initiated by Dr Dagada in his finance capacity and as Chairman of the Budget Steering Committee, to familiarise himself with the electricity utility’s capital projects. It was to help determine how the City could assist that, when allocating capital expenditure (capex) and operating expenditure (opex) budgets.
The tour was preceded by a presentation from the utility’s Managing Director, Sicelo Xulu, which covered aspects such as operations, mission, achievements and challenges. That was followed by a visit to the metering warehouse and control room, where Xulu and his team demonstrated how those facilities operated.
The councillors were taken on a tour of Pimville and Kliptown; two of the areas worst affected by illegal electricity connections. At Groblerspark Extension 9 in Roodepoort, they were shown how a prepaid smart meter is installed.
The tour also took them to the Kloofendal substation in Roodepoort and Sebenza in Kempton Park, where a new substation – said to be the biggest in Southern Africa – is being built at a cost of R882-million. Work on the substation is expected to be completed by December 2017.
Clr Dagada said the tour was an eye-opener, adding that he was humbled to know that City Power contributed 10% of South Africa’s energy. He said Executive Mayor, Cllr Herman Mashaba, had emphasised the need to grow Johannesburg’s economy by 5% by 2020.
Cllr Still said he was also highly impressed by City Power’s ‘first-class’ engineering and security of power supply. He said, like Cllr Dagada, he was convinced Johannesburg would have no power supply problems for the next 10 years or more.
Information Courtesy of CoJ.
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