, costing the economy an estimated R4 billion a day.
Despite the expectation of lowered stages from Monday, the utility says the capacity constraints will persist for a while. According to Eskom, this weekend’s blackouts were used to replenish the pumped storage dam levels, which were utilised extensively over the past week. In its last update, it said it’s experiencing constraints from its diesel suppliers that are affecting the availability of bulk diesel to the Ankerlig and Gourikwa Open Cycle Gas Turbines, which have a combined capacity of 2 000MW.
“It has gotten worse to higher levels of 5 and 6 as it impacts on the provision of health care services across the country. Minister has ordered the Director-General working with provincial heads of health departments to finalise the assessment of the impact already in the past week.