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South Africa's power utility Eskom is confident it will be able to meet this year's power demand, including during the World Cup, but supply will be tight from 2011-2012 unless new capacity is brought on stream.
Brian Dames, head of Eskom's generation business, said the Medupi and Kusile coal-fired power plants will provide a buffer once their first units come on stream in 2012 and 2014 respectively. The plants will each generate 4 800 MW.
But before they are commissioned, the system will be tight, he said. Power supply will also be stretched again after 2017 due to fast-rising demand.
He said a decision on the next baseload plant would need to be taken this year to avoid a repeat of a power crisis that brought the mining industry to a halt for days in early 2008, and affected other sectors, costing Africa's biggest economy billions of dollars.
"If we want a power plant by 2018-2019, somebody needs to decide this year what it should be, where it should be and who should do it ... we don't want to be in the same (critical) position again," Dames told Reuters in an interview on Thursday.
He said South Africa's power demand rose 8 percent during the first quarter from last year after the country started emerging from the recession.
Dames said he expects electricity demand to grow annually by 3% for the next 20 years, leading to a doubling of present demand levels of around 37 000 MW by 2030.
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