South Africa is living the ‘best-case scenario’ for load shedding
Electricity minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa says that one year after first being introduced, president Cyril Ramaphosa’s Energy Action Plan is bearing fruit, resulting in lower stages of load shedding and setting the country up for “energy abundance”.
Briefing the media on Sunday (9 July), Ramokgopa said that Eskom, working with over 100 experts from the private sector, has managed to mitigate further load shedding disasters, enable generation recoveries, and keep the country within the ‘best-case scenario’ for the utility’s winter load shedding outlook.
In May, Eskom’s winter load shedding outlook presented a bleak forecast for the country, entering the winter months with a near 6,500MW shortfall and demand expected to reach 33,000MW against a supply of around 26,500MW at the time.
Energy demand in 2022 was around 34,000MW and has spiked higher in the past. Supply, meanwhile, had dropped below 24,000MW in the first four months of the year.
The worst-case scenario, which would have pushed South Africa into stage 8 load shedding or beyond, would have seen unplanned outages and losses exceeding 18,000MW.
However, this has not materialised.
Supply has improved to around 28,000MW, while energy demand has remained exceptionally low at around 30,000MW, significantly narrowing the shortfall.
Eskom has also managed to keep outages around or below 15,000MW – which was seen as the best-case, keeping load shedding limited.
Because of these improved conditions, Eskom has managed to suspend load shedding entirely for most of the day during the week, moving only to stage 1 when needed, and stage 3 during the evening peaks.
The last time Eskom implemented stage 4 load shedding was 11 June 2023.
The minister attributed the improvements to several factors including, but not limited to, improved performance in problem power stations; assistance from the private sector; recoveries in load losses; and more effective maintenance working with original parts manufacturers.
There has also been significantly reduced demand, he said, with the public heeding the call to use electricity sparingly, switching off geysers and other heavy-use items. This, the minister said, should become normal behaviour for everyone in the country, even when South Africa enters times of energy abundance.
However, despite the improvements, the minister acknowledged that the load shedding crisis is not over and the country has not yet reached a point where load shedding can be fully suspended for extended periods of time – or even a full day.
However, Ramokgopa said that the power situation will continue to improve, with units at Kusile expected to come online near the end of the year and more generation capacity being added to the grid over time.
More energy coming online
The National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) has approved generation licences for five preferred bidders of the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy’s Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP).
The five preferred bidders were approved for the department’s Bid Window 6 at the regulator’s 29 June meeting.
“The five preferred bidders applied for generation licences in accordance with section 7 of the Electricity Regulation Act, 2006 (Act No.4 of 2006), which requires that no person may operate a generation facility without a licence issued by the Energy Regulator.
“NERSA analysed the applications and determined that they meet all the licensing requirements. No objections to the applications were received,” the Energy Regulator said on Friday.
The preferred bidders are: Doornhoek PV (Pty) Ltd; Boitumelo Solar Power Plant (RF) (Pty) Ltd; Kutlwano Solar Power Plant (RF) (Pty) Ltd; URSA Energy (RF) (Pty) Ltd and Antlia Energy (RF) (Pty) Ltd.
The sixth round of the REIPPPP Bid Window 6 is the second bid window to be procured in response to the Second Ministerial Determination.
The Bid Window called for new generation capacity of 4,200MW, made up of 3,200 MW wind energy resources and 1,000 MW Solar Photovoltaic energy resources.
The detailed Decision and Reasons for the Decision documents regarding the above decisions will be available on the NERSA website in due course.
With SA News
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