There is a more than 50% chance that the country’s energy grid will suffer a total collapse soon, energy analyst Ted Blom said on Wednesday.
“I believe that the probability of a grid meltdown is more than 50%,” he told a National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) panel at a public hearing in Johannesburg on Eskom’s application for a further hike in tariffs.
“A total grid collapse is what we don’t want to face because it will take you anything between a week and two weeks to recover, and I’m not even talking about the mayhem that will occur in the meantime.”
He said this was a topic that had been treated quietly until last Wednesday, where Eskom said there was a zero possibility of a grid collapse.
Blom then gave the rundown of his reasoning.
“According to my estimate, the weekend or overnight demand is around about 22GW … I might be wrong by a couple of gigawatts, I am not too worried about that.
“The peak demand is 35,5GW as we are told by Eskom — the winter demand,” he said.
“These are the numbers that only came out in the last week from the “war room” … that the serviced, or what you and I know as roadworthy generator sets are roughly 40% of the fleet. Fair condition, 12% of the fleet. Poor condition, 21% of the fleet, critical condition, 26% of the fleet.”
Blom said that if you add up the fair and roadworthy sets, you would get around 20GW.
“So you have 20 GW … the balance is poor and critical,” he said.
“The normal safety margin around the world is 15%, that is roughly 6,5GW.
“Eskom’s new winter strategy, they told us proudly last week, will only have a 1 000MW safety margin, and it is roughly 2,5% of what is considered an appropriate safety margin.
“So according to that, and I am willing to challenge anybody … I am forecasting that there is a better than 50% probability of a total grid collapse.”
Blom also ran through Eskom’s “state of health”, where he illustrated various shortfalls Eskom was suffering, including coal, water and maintenance .
“I don’t think it will survive five years in its current state … you decide that for yourself,” he said.
“I think it is patently clear that this Eskom is not sustainable, a fact that auditors should have whistle-blown on years ago, and I wonder why they haven’t … maybe they don’t want to lose the audit contract.”
He also said Eskom must not get its request for its hike.
The parastatal is applying for a 24,8% increase. It had already received a 12,6% increase, which would make up part of the 24,8%.
“As far as I am concerned, there is no legal basis for the re-opener [the application for the higher tariffs].” — News24
