By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Stage 4 load shedding will kick in on Thursday afternoon and remain in place until Friday morning due to a delay in returning seven generating units to service, Eskom said.
Thereafter, stage 3 load shedding will be implemented until 16h00. This pattern will repeat until Sunday, it said.
“Eskom will publish a further update as soon as there are any significant changes.”
The schedule is as follows:
Thursday, 5 January 2023
- Stage 3: until 16h00
- Stage 4: 16h00 to 00h00
Friday, 6 January 2023
- Stage 4: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 3: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 4: 16h00 to 00h00
Saturday, 7 January 2023
- Stage 4: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 3: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 4: 16h00 to 00h00
Sunday, 8 January 2023
- Stage 4: 00h00 to 05h00
- Stage 3: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 4: 16h00 to 00h00
The further delays in returning to service a generating unit each at Arnot, Camden, Kendal, Kriel, Matla and two units at Majuba power station has contributed to the capacity constraints.
Eskom currently has 6,014MW on planned maintenance, while another 17,278MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns and delays in returning generators to service.
“Eskom requests the public to reduce the usage of electricity and to exercise patience and tolerance during this difficult period.”
South Africa is likely to sit with prolonged levels of load shedding for the foreseeable future. In December 2022, 1,000MW was removed from the grid through Koeberg unit 1 being taken offline, and approximately 3,000MW is offline from various breakdowns at Kusile and Medupi.
According to Eskom’s outlook for the next year, it needs to keep breakdowns below 13,000MW to stave off the worst of load shedding, but the utility has struggled to keep outages below 16,000MW – the worst-case scenario in its plans.
Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter also recently announced his resignation on the back of the worst levels of load shedding on record. While Public Enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan acknowledged that de Ruyter is not to blame for the load shedding, the power utility has not been able to resolve the crisis under his leadership.
De Ruyter will be leaving the company at the end of March 2023. Eskom is still looking for his replacement.
For access to other load shedding schedules, Eskom has made them available on loadshedding.eskom.co.za.
Smartphone users can also download the app EskomSePush to receive push notifications when load shedding is implemented, as well as the times the area you are in will be off.