‘Load-shedding will remain a possibility for the immediate future’ – President Cyril Ramaphosa
The president made these remarks when he was delivering his much anticipated State of the Nation Address (SONA) last week.
“The reality that we will need to accept is that in order for Eskom to undertake the fundamental maintenance necessary to improve the reliability of supply, load-shedding will remain a possibility for the immediate future.” This is how President Cyril Ramaphosa summed up the current state on the nation with regard to the power supply and Eskom.
The president made these remarks when he was delivering his much anticipated State of the Nation Address (SONA) last week.
Sowetans were eager to hear if the government has a solid and practical plan to solve the problems at the power utility and end load shedding.
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Not only does load shedding inconveniences residents but it also puts a lot of strain on the government’s plans to rebuild the economy and to create jobs, the president confirmed.
While the government continues to work towards turning Eskom around and make it functional, Ramaphosa has urged the power utility to minimise disruptions and costs to firms and households by implementing load shedding in a manner that is predictable.
The plan as laid out at the SONA is to change the line of energy generation which will hopefully lift off some burden from Eskom.
To achieve this, the government plans to undertake the following:
– Development of additional grid capacity from renewable energy, natural gas, hydropower, battery storage, and coal.
– Initiate the procurement of emergency power from projects that can deliver electricity into the grid within 3 to 12 months from approval.
– The National Energy Regulator will continue to register small scale distributed generation for own use of under 1 MW, for which no license is required.
– The National Energy Regulator will ensure that all applications by commercial and industrial users to produce electricity for their own use above 1MW are processed within the prescribed 120 days. It should be noted that there is now no limit to installed capacity above 1MW.
– Open bid window 5 of the renewable energy IPP and work with producers to accelerate the completion of window 4 projects.
– Negotiate supplementary power purchase agreements to acquire additional capacity from existing wind and solar plants.
– We will also put in place measures to enable municipalities in good financial standing to procure their own power from independent power producers.
The president also announced that the power utility has started the process of divisionalising its three operating activities.
These operating activities which will have their own individual boards and managements are generation, transmission, and distribution.
“This is a historic and unprecedented development since it demonstrates the commitment of all social partners to take the necessary actions and make the necessary sacrifices to secure our energy needs,” said Ramaphosa.
While all these measures are being put in place, it does not mean that things will change overnight. Power supply will remain constrained for now according to the president.
Load shedding has been happening for about ten years now and by the look of things, it will keep getting worse if this plan of changing the trajectory of energy generation is not implemented soon.
For Soweto, the issue of the power supply is more than just load shedding as there also issues of non-payment with billions being owed to Eskom.
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