Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, may have a head start in the race between South African cities to buy their own power to alleviate load shedding.
Browsing: Energy and sustainability
The City of Johannesburg, facing an energy supply and energy infrastructure crisis, is turning to the private sector for urgent help.
Energy regulator Nersa has approved the first two 100MW private power projects in South Africa, with the two sites expected to come online in about 16 months.
Eskom expects to implement stage-2 power cuts during the evening peaks all of this week – assuming the situation doesn’t deteriorate.
Eskom, already struggling to avoid breakdown at its plants and nationwide blackouts, has another crisis on its hands: sabotage.
Eskom will cut the power, at stage 2, from 8am to 10pm on Saturday and Sunday as it rations diesel.
Eskom has filed charges with police over an incident of sabotage at the Tutuka power station, another obstacle as the utility struggles to meet electricity demand.
Eskom lost another generating unit at the Kusile power station on Monday afternoon, forcing the state-owned utility to escalate load shedding to stage 4.
Altron has reported a 37.8% increase in headline earnings per share from continuing operations on the back of a 5.7% improvement in full-year revenue.
Eskom chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer has warned that the current bout of load shedding could get worse if there are further plant breakdowns.