Image Source: The Citizen
Local – Despite the return of load shedding this week, Electricity and Energy Minister Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa remains confident that South Africa can still avoid significant power cuts this winter.
Speaking at a media briefing in Pretoria, the Minister explained that several power stations have returned to service since last year, putting Eskom in a stronger position.
“All of the things that we shared with the country regarding the winter outlook remain valid. In the winter outlook, we made the point that we enter winter 2025 on a much better footing than we did the winter of 2024,” he said.
He pointed to Koeberg unit 2, which returned to the grid on 30 December 2024, and Kusile unit 6, which was synchronised in March, adding around 800mw. Koeberg unit 1 is expected to return in July, and Medupi unit 4 will likely contribute to this winter’s supply.
“From a structural point of view… essentially, we’ve got 2500mw of additional capacity [as opposed to 2024]. That’s why when we shared [the winter outlook] with the country… We were very bullish, very optimistic about the prospects of a load-shedding-free winter or at worst stage 2 load shedding,” Ramokgopa said.
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Planned Maintenance Delays Blamed for Recent Setback
Still, the recent implementation of Stage 2 load shedding has raised concerns. Eskom said the decision was based on delays in returning 3,120mw from planned maintenance and a further 1,385mw lost to unplanned breakdowns.
This brought total unavailability to over 13,000mw, above the threshold where load shedding becomes unavoidable.
Ramokgopa did not shy away from criticism. “I think we’re getting to a point where there has to be consequence management if there is a promise to bring a unit by this date [and it doesn’t occur].
“That’s a planning function, and in this instance, we have not carried ourselves very well, and that’s why you see these outage slips.”
He added that difficult conversations are underway with Eskom’s executive team to ensure better planning and accountability going forward, and apologised for the lapse.
“It’s really not about the engineering performance of the units. It has to do with how we were able to manage this situation. We are having difficult, hard and candid conversations with the executive team to ensure that we are not experiencing these lapses,” he said.
Despite the setback, Ramokgopa remains hopeful and confident about a load-shedding-free winter.
“[We must] ensure that we get the units back on track. They must generate the megawatts at the time we have made the promise because the resources were made available,” he said.
