Stage 6 load shedding: Water supply under threat

There are more problems than solutions to the current power crisis as load shedding continues. The City of Tshwane councillor Daryl Johnston has warned stage 6 load shedding could lead to possible water outages.

Water flow interrupted

“While we have reservoirs with storage to last through short interruptions, these reservoirs rely on a continuous flow to maintain levels,” he said.

“That continuous flow relies on the pump stations running to pump water. With load shedding happening so frequently, the continuous flow of water is interrupted.

This means that reservoirs which are under significant pressure, such as high-lying reservoirs, may slowly have their water level lowered until they threaten to run dry.”

More load shedding on the cards

Energy expert Clyde Mallinson also warned more load shedding was on the cards should the capacity factors not increase soon.

Mallinson drew up a prediction table for load shedding levels versus the capacity factors available.

He said residents could experience further stage 6 load shedding that may rise to stage 8 or 10 should the power capacity drop to 40% coal fleet capacity.

“If the whole coal fleet installed capacity is 40GW, the capacity factor is 40%, which means the coal fleet only produces 16GW on average.

We are currently running between 40% and 45% with up and down variations depending on new breakdowns, and units returned to service,” he explained.

According to Mallinson’s calculations, load shedding stage 6 was probable for the next six months should the capacity of available energy factor not rise over the 50% mark.

“As the coal fleet available energy factor increases from 40% to 60%, the range of my estimates, the max expected load shedding reduces,” he said.

‘SA will deteriorate rapidly’

Action Society’s founder Ian Cameron said should load shedding continue, the country will deteriorate rapidly and become increasingly unstable and volatile.

“Not only will socioeconomic challenge increase, but criminals will also abuse the current state of affairs as much as they possibly can,” he said.

Criminologist Professor Jaco Barkhuizen said the inability to supply houses with uninterrupted electricity made residents vulnerable to criminals.

“Security systems and batteries only last that long,” he said.

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