City of Cape Town going ahead with its energy plan to help ease load shedding

The City of Cape Town says it is going ahead with its energy plans to help ease the impact of load shedding on residents and businesses. Mayor Dan Plato says the plans include establishing the Atlantis Power Station 2023 and procuring at least 3-hundred megawatts of energy from independent producers amongst others.

He says the city will also engage in continuous  consultations with national government to speed up the process. Plato says it’s unclear what is allowed by the Minerals and Energy Department in terms of dealing with independent power producers. The country is currently experiencing Stage 4 load shedding.

Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter says the power utility is building up reserves for election day.

Minister Gordhan ensures South Africans that no load shedding is expected on Monday 

Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan says no load shedding is expected when South Africans go to the polls on Monday for the Local Government Elections.

Gordhan says Eskom is likely to downgrade load shedding to Stage two for the rest of the week. No load shedding is expected over the weekend.

Gordhan was speaking during a virtual media briefing.

“Over the weekend, load shedding – I am told by the Eskom management – will stop. This means that as South Africans go to the polls on Monday and as the counting of votes continues there will be no load shedding unless there is some unexpected event which I am assured by the board and the Eskom management is an unlikely event.”

Gordhan and Eskom leadership briefing:

Eskom CEO on what is causing load shedding

Eskom CEO Andre de Ruyter has outlined the reasons behind the load shedding across the country, saying the securing of power reserves ahead of election day has been among the factors that necessitated the planned power cuts.

De Ruyter was addressing the online media conference along with Gordhan.

“One makes predictions and forecasts the stability of the system as we have seen with some humility and there is always a residual risk but part of the reason why we have load shedding right now is in order for us to replenish our reserves, both from storage as well as our diesel reserves. But that is why we took the decision to implement load shedding right now. It was made specifically with a view of securing supply and capacity during election day.”

Reaction to Minister Gordhan and Eskom’s response to load shedding: Ted Blom