By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
State owned power utility Eskom says that load shedding will be suspended briefly at midnight on Sunday but stage 1 will resume at 05:00 on Monday morning until 16:00.
Thereafter, stage 2 load shedding will kick in overnight, and this is expected to continue until further notice.
Sunday, 27 November
- Stage 2: until 00h00
Monday, 28 November
- Stage 1: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage 2: 16h00 to 00h00
Tuesday, 29 November
- Stage 2: 00h00 to 05h00
- No load shedding: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage2: 16h00 to 00h00
Wednesday, 30 November, and beyond until further notice
- Stage 2: 00h00 to 05h00
- No load shedding: 05h00 to 16h00
- Stage2: 16h00 to 00h00
“It is anticipated that no load shedding will be implemented during the day from Tuesday. Eskom will publish a further update as soon as there are any significant changes,” it said.
The continued implementation of load shedding is mainly due to the high levels of breakdowns and the limited emergency generation reserves.
The utility said it currently has 5,032MW on planned maintenance, while another 16,390MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns.
South Africans have become accustomed to ongoing bouts of stage 2 load shedding, which have become the norm, but with a key unit in Eskom’s fleet coming offline in December for maintenance – and staying offline until the middle of next year – the risk of load shedding at even higher stages, for longer periods, is high.
In addition to this, critical failures, explosions and sabotage are also dragging on supply, with many of these issues anticipated to keep the grid under strain for the next 12 months.
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.