Eskom urges residents to report power outages
Whilst the power system has remained stable with no load shedding being implemented for nine months, some customers, particularly at municipal level, may have experienced localised power outages due to cable theft, technical faults and overloading.
“We urge customers to report such outages to their suppliers,” says Eskom.
Municipal customers can contact the Ekurhuleni Metro’s call centre on 086 054 3000.
Customers are reminded that power failures on distribution lines have a variety of causes.
Lightning is a frequent cause of power failures.
The thinner power line conductors on the smaller power lines can be severed by lightning.
Lightning strikes can also cause permanent damage to insulators or equipment connected to the power line, such as transformers, surge arresters or circuit breakers.
Cable theft is also a major contributor to power failures.
Eskom regularly holds aggressive awareness campaigns to inform the public of the negative effects of cable theft.
“We work closely with communities to encourage them to report any illegal cable thefts.”
Vandalism is another major cause of power failures.
Stones, metal implements and other objects thrown at pylons and lines or shots fired at insulators can cause damage.
Vehicles crashing into poles or similar accidents can damage lines and poles.
Trees or branches blown onto lines can cause short circuits which might be brief, occurring only when the wind blows.
Attempts are made to limit environmental damage, and not to cut down trees unless absolutely necessary.
“This, however, adds to the problem of keeping power lines free of potentially hazardous trees,” says Eskom.
Though Eskom patrols the power line routes regularly, patrolmen are responsible for hundreds of kilometres of line in their district and might not always locate these potentially problematic trees.
Repair work
Supplies are sometimes interrupted on purpose to enable maintenance work to be performed on equipment.
When such work is planned, Eskom takes all reasonable steps to warn the customers concerned beforehand.
Road workers sometimes dig up local supply cables, disrupting power in that particular area.
Overload
At times the demand for electricity increases to the point that the system becomes overloaded.
Unless Eskom reduces load by cutting off supply temporarily to certain users, there will be a complete blackout affecting all customers for a protracted period of time.
Load reduction measures, which can be implemented if an overload is foreseen or occurs slowly, are designed to spread the supply interruptions as equally as possible among all customers.
Often, however, overloads happen without warning and action must be taken automatically.
