The power utility briefed the media in Johannesburg on its energy outlook ahead of the summer season.
Eskom says while load shedding remains suspended for four months, the power utility continues to face network overloading issues in certain areas due to illegal connections. “For this coming summer our prognosis is that if we stay below 13 000 MW of unplanned losses, we will be able to avoid load shedding. At worst if an unlikely situation we get to 15 000 MW of unplanned losses, we will experience at most stage 2. Our focus is really driving this by managing unplanned losses and ensuring that the stations return from maintenance on time within planned schedules,” says Dan Marokane, Eskom Group CEO.
“Operationally we’ve always understood that to bring the business back to a good footing we need to perform, we need to produce electricity to the capacity that we have installed and be able to sell it. We are now producing that electricity; our next focal point is making sure that we get paid for what we supply. Of course, we still have a huge debt and working with National Treasury to support the issues of debt relief.