Cape Town - What Eskom has called a “temporary setback” in implementing load shedding at the weekend, and then suspending it, has been met with concern by energy watch dogs and consumers, who fear they may have to scrape the bottom of the barrel to make ends meet and to keep the lights on.
This follows a ten month uninterrupted electricity supply, with the clock being set back to day one when Eskom announced suspension of load shedding, linking the success to their effective Generation Recovery Plan.
Eskom said in a statement on Sunday that various factors impacted services including criminality and unlicensed vendors and would provide an update on their status by Friday.
“With load shedding largely behind us, the structural improvements and efficiency gains we have made in our coal-fired generation fleet are secure, along with the over R16.30 billion saved in diesel costs from April 1, 2024, to January 30, 2025” they said.
“Eskom continues to face network overloading issues in certain local areas due to illegal connections, vandalism, meter tampering, unauthorised network operations, theft of network equipment, and purchasing electricity from unlicensed vendors.”
Energy activist and expert, Peter Becker, former director of the board of the National Nuclear Regulator (NNR) and of the Koeberg Alert Alliance said not enough was being done to preserve energy.
“The concept of reserve margin, most healthy utilities that produce electricity want to be able to produce 15 % more than the demand and that is called the reserve margin,” he explained.
“We are basically on zero percent reserve margin and that is why we are sensitive to these things but we should be in a healthy place.”
Becker said wastage where illegal vendors manipulated the system and grid, took a huge chunk out of Eskom’s expenditure, which could be utilised to help save consumers and many others.
“The announcement that R27 billion was going to vendors,” he said. “That is R27 000 a year and that represents in kilowatt hours about percent of Eskom’s production.
“With that they could have bought diesel to keep it running.
“Municipalities need to get organised or get audited to be organised. There is a lot of tightening up that can be done.
“We have had electricity prices sky rocket over the last few years. This is hitting the poor at an incredibly sensitive place. People are struggling, it now becomes a choice, do you buy electricity or do you buy food for the evening?”
Natasha Gertse, founder of Electricity Tariffs Must Fall, said the consumer was being sidelined into accepting their fate while safety and livelihoods were at stake.
“Nersa increased less from what Eskom asked but it is still unfair towards the consumers because we do not need an increase, we need relief,” she added.
“The increase and load shedding is just shoved down on us. What about the safety of people in the community? It's dangerous in areas such as Mitchell’s Plain.”
Nicholas Gotsell, DA Constituency Head for Atlantis, Blaauwberg and Table View said the reality was that Eskom was unpredictable and affected the livelihood of consumers.
“Recently residents on Parklands Main Road went without power from Christmas Eve until after Boxing Day – almost 80 hours – celebrating a dark, powerless Christmas,” he explained.
“Eskom remains unable to ensure consistent power supply to many residents and business owners in the City of Cape Town.”