A sensationalist headline. The concerning part is that snippet of information is that it comes from City Power, Joburg municipality’s electricity company. Its a combination of many storms. Failing and grossly undermaintained infrastructure, lack of capacity to attend to breakdowns, theft and vandalism of that same infrastructure and a budget that is woefully inadequate […]
Joburg electricity on the brink of collapse! Read More »
Private and commercial rooftop solar installations have taken an enormous amount of pressure off of Eskom’s generation division. This is predominantly during the day, but it does still allow Eskom some breathing space from their notoriously unreliable coal powered generation fleet. This also means that more paying customers are less reliant on Eskom and that
Stage 8 still a likelihood Read More »
Stating the obvious is what many of us do best, this also possibly doubles as the world’s worst kept secret. The details behind Eskom’s many failures. A very recent photograph had a meeting between a trade unionist (Mantashe), a pharmacist (Gordhan) and a lawyer (Ramaphosa) having a meeting about finding a solution for the country’s
More obvious than explosive Eskom updates Read More »
It was very possibly a bright sunny day in 2007, when then president Mbeki was told by the Eskom executive that if they did not start building more capacity, the country would suffer power shortages. Many failed tenders, failed power stations later, we are back to enforced romantic candlelit dinners. Eskom has released some projections
‘load’ shedding will get worse before it gets better, 2028….perhaps? Read More »
In these dark times (pun intended), this is an ongoing argument. The article link below goes to the trouble of doing the math based on initial outlay and running costs of a generator. The one exclusion on the generator was the cost of servicing the unit every 100 hours at another R1000 a pop! Then
Generator vs solar system! The pros and cons Read More »
The current ‘government’ was warned in Thabo Mbeki’s time that power supply was going to become a major issue if projects were not implemented. That was pre-2007. This was then used as a get rich quick scheme by numerous ANC cadres as well as their investment arm via a Hitachi ‘JV’. By JV they mean
Paved with good intentions: The road to hell Read More »
Situated in the East Rand, is Eskom’s 24/7/365 power management centre. This is where they can see what happens to power and when. The recent stage 4 load shedding was as close to stage 5 as we have come. Of Eskom’s coal power fleet, 50% were either having maintenance done or had tripped. 25% of
Eskom black-out is a possibility Read More »
Insurers are some of the most profitable companies in any country. Limiting risk and protecting their margins by repudiating claims comes with the territory. We all know of someone whose are claims repudiated or adjusted based on some minor infraction. you are over/under insured. It wasn’t declared or itemised, it is not covered under clause
When insurers recommend a switch to alternative power sources dan weet jy HKK! Read More »
Andre De Ruyter is taking flak from all sides. His position is unenviable. He is carrying the can for troubles dating back to 2007 when the then president Mbheki was warned that the country needed to develop more power generation. He made the poor decision to do nothing. The straw to break the camels back
Stage 5 load shedding on its way Read More »
2021 was Eskom’s worst performance since inception in terms of number of days of load shedding/reduction. The aging generation plants are sorely in need of maintenance and Kusile and Medupi are still generating nowhere near the capacity they were designed for. It is unlikely they ever will. Ongoing design and construction flaws as well as
2021 load ‘shedding’ was a warm up, hold my beer! Read More »
