Load shedding update for this weekend
Scheduled blackouts are unlikely to take place on Friday (6 March) with the same forecast expected for the weekend, Eskom said.
“Our aspiration is not to have load shedding today and the weekend,” spokesman Khulu Phasiwe said.
“We are doing everything possible to avoid having to implement load shedding.”
He said the electricity situation remained the same as earlier this week.
The company issued the following forecast:
- Friday 06 March: The capacity available to meet this evening peak demand is 31 412 MW (including open cycle gas turbines) while demand is forecast at 29 601 MW.
- Saturday 07 March: The capacity available to meet that evening’s peak demand is 30 484 MW (including open cycle gas turbines) while demand is forecast at 28 413 MW.
- Sunday 08 March: The capacity available to meet that evening’s peak demand is 31 096 MW (including open cycle gas turbines) while demand is forecast at 28 598 MW.
“The capacity available to meet demand depends on the number of generating units that are on planned maintenance,” Eskom said.
“We urge all South Africans to partner with us to save 10% of their electricity usage throughout the day. This will make it significantly easier to manage the power system during this challenging time, while also enabling us to do planned maintenance to ensure the reliability of our plant.”
Support from customers and the fact that some generators were back online had curbed power cuts this week, Phasiwe said.
On 2 March 2015 unit 6 at Medupi started producing power for the first time, marking the end to years of delays hindering the switch-on.
“Within the next three months, South Africa will see Medupi unit six’s full potential of 794MW being fed into the South African national grid,” Eskom chief executive Tshediso Matona said earlier this week.
Medupi’s total output of 4,764MW however, is only expected to be synchronised to the grid by 2019.
With Sapa
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