STAGE 8 LOOMS CLOSER

SA might have to forego Boney M and colourful festive lights

ESKOM could go down as the Grinch that stole Christmas this year as South Africa heads into the festive season and load shedding continues unabated.

Despite a boost of 50 million litres of diesel supplied by state-owned entity PetroSA this week, experts warn it will last for only 10 days and the situation is unlikely to improve.

“We are certainly moving closer to a stage 8 total grid meltdown, the chances are more than 70%. And we will see level 6 load shedding before the end of the year,” said energy analyst Ted Blom.

He said stage 8 meant 13 hours of load shedding a day. The load-shedding app EskomSePush said that so far this year, there had been 2 975 hours (124 days) of load shedding.

Yesterday afternoon Eskom tweeted that load shedding would be maintained at Stage 2 until further notice. “There will be no Stage 3 load shedding during the evenings, as had been previously communicated,” it said.

According to Blom, who previously worked at Eskom, load shedding could not be prevented by burning diesel: it would only have an impact on the stage of load shedding implemented.

“The level of load shedding can be two to three times lower if they burn diesel. If there is not enough plant running on the coal side, then the diesel can’t stop load shedding. The question is: Did that diesel suddenly fall out of the sky? Who is paying for it?” asked Blom.

Minister of Public Enterprises Pravin Gordhan said the issue of payment for the diesel still needed to be worked out.

This week Eskom warned that load shedding would be more erratic because of diesel shortages as the diesel generation capacity normally provided a buffer when its generating units broke down.

Eskom’s group chief operating officer Jan Oberholzer recently said: “Due to the vulnerability and unpredictability of the power system, coupled with the major capital projects, maintenance and major repairs, the risk of continued load shedding remains quite high.”

He said the loss of capacity would “make for a very challenging summer”.

For those worried about the big days in December, Blom warned that the possibility of load shedding on Christmas Day was higher than 50%.

“Eskom burns 9 million litres a day so the diesel will last five, maybe six days. They are not going to burn the diesel flat out, they are going to burn half of that a day so it can last.”

Matric pupils worried that this would affect the release of their final results have been assured that all will be well. Biki Lepota, a spokesperson for Umalusi, the council for quality assurance in education, said while load shedding would have an impact on the marking of matric exams, it would not be as severe as it had been in writing centres.

“There are 7 200 exam centres versus around 500 marking centres. It will be easier to make plans, such as installing generators, at marking centres,” he said.

Hospital group Netcare said they could still deliver safe services because all its facilities had back-up generators.

“With the increasing load shedding frequency, Netcare facilities have used more than double the amount of diesel compared with previous years. We have no option but to make provision for back-up power to keep our hospitals operational,” said Andre Nortje, the group’s national environmental sustainability manager.

The unpredictable power supply has also had devastating effects on food production. Christo van der Rheede, executive director of Agri SA, called load shedding “the biggest constraint on South Africa’s economic growth”.

“Achieving energy security is (SA’s) single most important objective.”

It affected different aspects of agriculture in different ways. For example, it can force farmers to irrigate at the wrong time, such as during the heat of the day. It was also time consuming to ensure it was done correctly.

There was a yield loss if farmers were not driving around restarting pumps and boreholes.

Pack houses with thousands of workers stopped when the power went off.

“Staff must get up very early or get home late from duties such as milking. They then have no lights, stoves or other amenities that they depend on.”

While the tourism industry hoped to recover from Covid-related losses, it had also taken a knock.

The East Coast chairperson of the Federated Hospitality Association of Southern Africa, Brett Tungay, said the effects had been devastating.

He said despite the government’s call to develop small businesses, they were the ones suffering the most because of the cost of power generation.

Tungay, who owns the Dragon Peaks Mountain Resort in the Drakensberg, said there were businesses that were literally burning their profit in diesel.

“If I take my own resort, we are literally paying guests to stay here … it’s expected as a resort or hotel to have the lights on. Whether you have 30 guests or 300 guests, your generators run.”