Eskom Chief Executive Officer Andre de Ruyter has refuted claims made by Mineral Resource and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe that the power utility is holding up the emergency power procurement process.
During a media briefing, De Ruyter revealed that Eskom had not had sight of the emergency power procurement agreement and was therefore not in a position to sign off on it.
De Ruyter was responding to questions about earlier reports saying the minister had accused Eskom of delaying the emergency power procurement process including the Karpowership project.
“Eskom has not received final documentation from the IPP office, specifically the power purchase agreement, and of course we need to know what we are signing before we can sign off on an agreement. It’s a bit difficult to sign off on an agreement when you don’t know what it looks like. The maximum price methodology from Nersa hasn’t been finally addressed between Nersa, the IPP office, and DMRE.”
The power utility has been facing challenges with supplying power as a result of the aging infrastructure.
Earlier this week, Eskom implemented rolling blackouts:
