Photo by: Bjorn Rudner
Parastatal Eskom says it will “rework” the maintenance plans of its power plants to ensure there is enough electricity to meet demand, adding that, while the national electricity system will be stable on Thursday night, it will be tight over the evening peak hours and is expected to remain tight for the rest of the week.
The energy utility said in its biweekly system status bulletin on Thursday that the refuelling of Unit 2 at the Koeberg nuclear power station, near Cape Town, in the Western Cape, was proceeding well and was due back in service in middle of May.
Repairs on the transmission line from Cahora Bassa, in Mozambique, which was out of service and, thereby, reduced South Africa’s imports from Mozambique by 600 MW from 1 500 MW, were also in progress.
Contractors had been appointed and were proceeding with getting the line operational as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, an investigation into the incident that took place at Duvha power station’s Unit 3 on March 30, which resulted in rolling power outages, was ongoing.
Eskom would report on the results of the engineering assessment once they became available.
The peak demand forecast for the rest of this week was 30 642 MW on Friday, 29 494 MW on Saturday, 29 438 MW on Sunday, 32 052 MW on Monday, 32 097 MW on Tuesday and 32 114 MW on Wednesday.