Former Eskom COO staying to fight load shedding: report
Retired Eskom Chief Operations Officer (COO) Jan Oberholzer will stay on at Eskom to oversee a series of new projects aimed at lessening load shedding.
As reported by EE Business Intelligence, Oberholzer, who retired on 30 April 2023, will continue at the embattled power utility but not as COO, where he oversaw all of Eskom’s operations, including generation.
Oberholzer’s new role comes as the nation faces ongoing stage 6 load shedding, which could worsen over the next few winter months.
The first and only Eskom COO said that 2023 would continue to be a difficult year in regard to power outages.
However, he noted that work was on schedule to fix the problems at the embattled coal-fired power plants of Medupi and Kusile and to extend the license at Koeberg, South Africa’s only nuclear power station, by another 20 years.
That being said, the former COO said that the utility would miss its targets to increase its overall energy availability factor (EAF).
Although Public Minister Pravin Gordhan and Eskom board chairman Mpho Makwana had an EAF target of 60% for the 2022/23 trending year, the EAF achieved for the financial year was 56.56%.
The 2023/24 financial year has an EAF target of 65%.
Oberholzer said that Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa’s plan to extend the life of Eskom coal-fired power plants could work, but it has to make economic sense to be done.
Barbara Creecy, the Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and Environment, said that environmental laws allow for the slowing down of the decommissioning of coal power plants.
Although South Africa remains committed to its National Determined Contribution (NDC) to cut its greenhouse gas emissions as provided to the United Nations, Creecy said that the nation should not decommission its existing power stations amidst an energy crisis.
“We are saying that within the 2030 timeframe, there is room to reconsider the decommissioning of power plants,” said the minister. “It is not necessary to do it right now.”
However, she said that if coal power stations continue to live beyond 2030, they will no longer be exempt from minimum standards related to air pollution.
Read: ‘Shameless’ Mantashe shifts the blame for load shedding
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