Stage-six loadshedding is unacceptable, according to Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, who said power cuts beyond stage four should be avoided at all cost.
“If we can avoid intense stages of loadshedding, we will avoid it,” Ramakgopa said during a media briefing held in Pretoria on Monday.
He said ending loadshedding has nothing to do with a summer season, but with capacity and availability of power generating.
The minister apologised for the recent increase in blackouts, blaming it on a drop in generating capacity coinciding with bad weather in Gauteng and other parts of the country.
The residents of Gauteng experienced an unusual cold front which swept through the province and brought with it snowflakes, light rain and strong winds on Monday last week.
Snow is a rare occurrence in Gauteng, with snowfall having been experienced in May 1956, August 1962, June 1964, September 1981 and on June 27 2007.
September 1981 had the greatest snowfall on record, with statistics showing snowfall accumulating up to 10cm across the province.
He said since April, more than 2 000 cases have been reported to the police, and over 1 500 of them have been opened with 100 convictions.
“The electricity crisis committee is making a significant change in making sure that corruption is eradicated at Eskom,” he said.
In June, Ramokgopa met with Carlos Zacarias, Mozambique’s Minister of Mineral Resources and signed a deal to help stabilise South Africa’s power grid.
At the time, he confirmed that South Africa will get 100 megawatts from the neighbouring country.
“For now, we will get 100 megawatts and another 600 megawatts in six months’ time. We are very grateful to the people of Mozambique,” said Ramokgopa at the time, noting that Eskom’s new leadership has made great strides in addressing the power crisis.
Ramokgopa also said there is concern that unit 1 at Koeberg nuclear power station in Cape Town, which is on a maintenance outage for a steam generator replacement, will not be returned to service by the middle of September as anticipated.
The nuclear power station’s unit 2 is due for a six-month shutdown in October for its steam-generator replacement.
If unit 1 is not returned on time, this could mean that both generating units will be out of service at the same time, depriving South of an additional 920MW.
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