South Africans experienced some necessary relief from darkness this weekend. Beginning Friday, 15 September, the load-shedding schedule showed a reduction in power cuts from stage 6 to between stages 2 and 4. The country’s power utility announced on its social media pages that there has been less pressure on the grid. Loadshedding will remain at stage 1 from 12 p.m. until 4 p.m. on Monday, 18 September, and be followed by stage 3 until 5 a.m. on Tuesday, 19 September.
Stages 2 and 4 should be implemented in a pattern until further notice. Eskom will publish further updates if any significant changes occur.
Load-shedding Schedule to Show a Reduction
During the weekend, the load-shedding schedule showed a 23-hour suspension due to an improvement in generation capacity and lower-than-anticipated demand.
In an update given on Sunday, 17 September, Electricity minister Dr. Kgosientsho Ramokgopa excitedly announced that Kusile power station unit 4 returned to service after a 20-day maintenance outage, restoring 800MW to the grid. The unit had come back online that morning.
More Electricity on the Load-shedding Schedule by the End of the Year
Units 1, 2, and 3 of the newly built Kusile power station in Mpumalanga were taken offline because of damage that was caused by an accident in October 2022. These three units are expected to come online between October and the end of November 2023.
“We’ve been able to shed a month on the return of unit 3 and the expectation is that we should be able to return this unit by 14 October. The same is applicable for unit 1. We should be able to get it on 30 October,” the minister said.
Ramokgopa said that Eskom will be bringing another 4,000 MW onstream by the end of the year (which should amount to about 4 stages of load-shedding) and will soon release its summer load-shedding schedule so that the country can plan for the next six months. There will be more planned maintenance outages, but also more electricity from Kusile.
The scheduled increase in electrical capacity should look something like this:
- Unit 1 (by 30 October – 800MW)
- Unit 2 (by November – 800MW)
- Unit 3 is expected to operate more than a month earlier (by 14 October 2023 – 800MW)
- Unit 5 (by December 30-800MW; two months late)
This is good news for South African citizens. Currently, load-shedding costs the nation up to R1 billion a day. More stable electricity will result in more opportunities for everyone.
