Cape Town - A media briefing by the president and the newly established National Energy Crisis Committee of Ministers, (Necom) comprising all government departments and Eskom, was held where their plan to end load shedding and secure achieve energy security was further detailed.
The committee was mobilising all resources at its disposal to achieve energy security by focusing on a limited number of high-impact interventions.
Necom was lead by the director-general in the Presidency Phindile Baleni and would report to an Inter-Ministerial Committee chaired by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele said: “Our short-term objective is to reduce the severity and frequency of load shedding through immediate measures to stabilise the energy system. Our long-term objective is to end load shedding altogether.”
Gungubele said they would first focus on improving the performance of Eskom’s existing power stations, and second on adding as much new generation capacity to the grid as possible, as quickly as possible.
The plan announced by Ramaphosa included five interventions with specific actions and time frames to address the electricity shortfall; to enable and accelerate private investment in generation capacity, to accelerate procurement of new capacity from renewables, gas and battery storage, to unleash businesses and households to invest in rooftop solar, and to fundamentally transform the electricity sector to achieve long-term energy security.
The energy crisis committee revealed the first steps in this plan included the refurbishment of six power plants, purchasing energy from neighbouring countries, and increasing renewable energy output.
On Tuesday Eskom said Stage 2 load shedding might be implemented at short notice over the next three days due to a shortage of generation capacity. On Wednesday morning, the power supplier announced that Stage 2 load shedding would be implemented from 4pm - 12pm, and at the same time on Thursday.
“The delay in returning a generation unit to service each at Arnot, Koeberg and the Kusile power stations, as well as the unplanned outage of a generation unit each at Camden, Medupi and two units each at Grootvlei, Hendrina and Majuba power stations, have exacerbated the capacity constraints.
“Some generation units are anticipated to return to service over the next few days.We currently have 2 931MW on planned maintenance, while another 15 051MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns,” Eskom said.
“Eskom would like to remind the public that load shedding is implemented only as a last resort to protect the national grid.”
The City of Cape Town, in response, announced that its customers would be on Stage 1 from 5pm to 7pm.
⚡️ Load-shedding update 3 August
— City of Cape Town (@CityofCT) August 3, 2022
Eskom Stage 2 load-shedding from 16:00 - 24:00 today and tomorrow, 4 August
City customers
Stage 1: 17:00 - 19:00 only
Updates to follow.
Reduce usage.
Switch off: Avoid damage and tripping #CTInfo pic.twitter.com/f1JnRbEelQ
With the return of power cuts across South Africa once again, GOOD secretary-general and MP Brett Herron said it was clear that the president’s plan was a commonsense plan that was 15 years too late.
Herron said the cutting of red tape, focus on renewable energy production and mass infrastructure repairs were not revolutionary ideas by any means, and while this plan and Necom was a positive step forward, it was one that needed to be welcomed with caution.
On Tuesday the DA also presented its Energy and Electricity Policy.
Kevin Mileham, DA spokesperson on mineral resources and energy, responded to Necom’s plan and said these interventions were not new and had been presented to the Presidency for years.
He said the DA would be establishing an energy tracker where they would be looking at the promises the president made and tracking the delivery against this.