Eskom this week marked another milestone in the recovery of its generation performance: six months without load shedding.

The last time the state-owned electricity utility was forced to impose load shedding – not load reduction, which is an unrelated issue – was on 26 March. That was 184 days ago.

“Operational efficiency has remained in line with summer expectations, with unplanned outages averaging 11.9GW over the past seven days, compared to 14.8GW in the same period last year,” Eskom said in a statement on Friday. The summer period began on 1 September.

“From the beginning of the summer period to date, planned maintenance has averaged 6.4GW, an increase from 5.3GW during the same period last year. This increase aims to further enhance the reliability of our generation fleet. Meanwhile, unplanned outages have averaged 11.5GW, a significant improvement from 15.9GW last year,” the company said.

However, in the past week, Eskom has made significant use of its diesel-burning open-cycle gas turbines, in part because of a problem at the Koeberg nuclear power station near Cape Town.

“Over the past week, the strategic OCGT plants have seen extensive usage due to delays in restoring the full 2.7GW generation capacity, which was supposed to be returned to service by Monday, 23 September. Additionally, higher-than-expected electricity demand driven by cold weather has contributed to this situation.”

Cold front

South Africa experienced an unseasonably strong cold front over the past week, with weather forecasts suggesting another cold snap could be in store from Monday, with temperatures of below 20 degrees expected in Johannesburg for the first half of next week.

Despite the increased utilisation of the OCGT plants, Eskom said it has still achieved a marked reduction in diesel consumption since 1 April. Since then, Eskom has burned its way through R5.8-billion worth of diesel. While that’s a significant amount of money, it is a fraction of the R17.1-billion the utility spent on diesel in the same period in 2023, when load shedding was at its worst.

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Eskom’s energy availability factor averaged 59% over the past week and is at 63% for the year to date. “Top-performing stations like Kusile, Majuba, Camden and the peaking stations maintained an EAF above 70%. Additionally, two other power stations sustained an EAF above 60%. The ongoing improvement in the generation fleet’s performance is credited to the recovery plan, accelerated maintenance, collaboration with original equipment manufacturers, and the dedication of power station managers and their teams,” Eskom said.

It said, too, that its unplanned capacity loss factor “continues to be on a downward trend at 25.4% for the financial year to date (from 1 April), improving from 34.3% in the corresponding period last year.” — © 2024 NewsCentral Media