Eskom’s unplanned power cuts a major issue – energy specialist

Energy specialist Lungile Mashele said the “hazard approach” by Eskom of taking the country to stage 4 load shedding on a Sunday because of diesel shortages was a big issue.

Especially since the public was not informed of the shortages.

Eskom’s diesel shortages

Better communication needed

She said Eskom should communicate better and more effectively with the public about whether the state-owned power utility was actually doing maintenance.

“At least we would understand why they were having so many breakdowns,” she said.

According to Mashele, there was generally a diesel shortage problem globally because South Africa was competing with world majors for diesel – with refineries in the United States and Europe also having to undergo maintenance.

Global diesel shortages

“There is no diesel stock globally, and this is why the price of diesel has been increasing”, Mashele said.

“In SA, we do not have any coal refineries that are better operational; we only have Sasol.

“So, it does put pressure on the diesel stock, especially because Eskom needs them for their open cycle gas turbine plants,” she added.

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“This is also affected by global supply chain issues of diesel, and it will only get worse if we have to compete with other countries for diesel, especially with the change of season as they getting into winter and we know they have their energy supply issues.

“Many of them will be burning diesel as well. It has driven up the price of diesel globally with a lot of factors and demands.”

Eskom’s spokesperson Sikonathi Mantshantsha said: “Load shedding is implemented only as a last resort in view of the shortage of generation capacity and the need to attend to breakdowns”.

Stage 4 load shedding

Should South Africa just move permanently to stage 4 due to constant breakdowns?

Mashele said permanent stage 4 load shedding would not help unless Eskom were actually running a reliable maintenance programme.

“If we are moving to permanent stage 4 with no plan, and there is actually no plan in place, then that is a failure on their part,” she said.

“It is just not a good option.”