Eskom has not loadshed since Wednesday and loadshedding will not be implemented on Friday.
“While we have seen a number of improvements on the system over the past two days, we have a number of additional unplanned unit outages that occurred overnight, necessitating the use of emergency reserves to supplement capacity today,” the power utility said.
“Unplanned outages or breakdowns were at 9 835MW as at 06:00 this morning and planned maintenance is above 7 000MW.
“As the system remains vulnerable, we remind customers that loadshedding can be implemented at short notice if there is a change in the system performance.”
Eskom said that it will communicate if there is any additional shift and will provide a prognosis for tomorrow later today.
“We request customers to continue to use electricity sparingly and to reduce demand over this period.”
Eskom also wishes to remind South Africans that there is a possibility of increased loadshedding over the next 18 months as it is conducting critical maintenance to restore the ageing plant to good health.
To assist us in reducing demand:
- Set air-conditioners’ average temperature at 23ºC
- Switch off your geysers over peak periods
- Use the cold water tap rather than using the geyser every time
- Set your swimming pool pump cycle to run twice a day, three hours at a time
- At the end of the day, turn off computers, copiers, printers and fax machines at the switch.
“We appeal to customers to revisit their loadshedding schedules on the Eskom (https://loadshedding.eskom.co.za) or local municipal websites, depending on their electricity supplier, to review amendments.”