Eskom has announced the early return of load shedding this week. Photo: iStock
South Africans’ respite from load shedding has come to an end as Eskom announced the commencement of Stage 2 load shedding, set to run from 5am to 4pm starting this Tuesday, 2 January.
Subsequently, Stage 3 load shedding will persist until 5am on Wednesday.
Eskom attributed the necessity of these measures to setbacks in bringing back three generating units (2,148MW) to the grid.
Additionally, a loss of six generating units (3,113MW) and an anticipated surge in electricity demand contribute to the need for staged load shedding, Eskom said.
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In an official statement, Eskom stated: “Due to the ongoing intensified maintenance aimed at enhancing fleet performance, we encountered a setback with three generating units (2,148MW) not returning online as expected.
“This, combined with the loss of six generating units (3,113MW) and an anticipated increase in electricity demand, mandates the implementation of Stage 2 load shedding from 5am on Tuesday until 4pm, followed by Stage 3 load shedding until 5am on Wednesday.”
The power utility also informed South Africans that this routine of Stage 2 load shedding in the morning and Stage 3 load shedding in the evening will be a daily occurrence until further notice.
Eskom went on to say that it was assuring the public that it will closely monitor the power system and communicate any changes as needed.
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Eskom also shared details on the current status of outages, noting unplanned outages at 16,231MW of generating capacity and planned maintenance causing 8,451MW of capacity to be offline.
The parastatal emphasised its commitment to restoring 4,921MW of generating capacity before the week concludes.
According to Eskom, the evening peak demand forecast for Tuesday is 23,011MW.
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