Proposals to reorganise the R454-billion owed by Eskom are days away from completion, according to an official who’s overseen their formulation.
Browsing: Energy and sustainability
The bold proposal by Cosatu to relieve Eskom of close to 60% of its debt using pension money may be presented by President Cyril Ramaphosa in next week’s state of the nation address.
Eskom warned that stage-2 load shedding will continue until the end of the week and is likely this weekend, too, and South Africans should get used to regular rolling blackouts for the next year and a half.
The Democratic Alliance has lambasted a government proposal to create a second state-owned electricity generation company in South Africa, labelling the plan “utter madness”.
Transnet is working with Eskom to reduce the ailing power utility’s costs by increasing the supply of coal delivered by rail and improving the quality and reliability of the primary feedstock for its thermal plants.
South Africa should establish a new entity that would generate electricity and reduce the nation’s reliance on state utility Eskom, mineral resources & energy minister Gwede Mantashe said.
Eskom’s new CEO, André de Ruyter, hopes to regain South Africa’s trust by addressing operational stability at the power utility.
Eskom will implement rolling blackouts until at least Thursday, the failing, government-owned electricity utility said on Sunday.
Eskom has warned South Africans to brace for more frequent power cuts as it halts the deferral of planned maintenance. The rand weakened as a result.
Eskom will resume cutting 2GW from the South African grid at 9am on Friday until 6am on Monday due to a shortage of generation capacity and depleted emergency resources.