[miningmx.com] – SOUTH African power utilitu, Eskom, warned customers today it would implement a new round of load-shedding unless demand was cut by 10% having already asked industrial users to throttle back power usage.
“Our big industrial users have already cut back power by about 10%, and some by more, so now we need municipalities and general customers to bring demand down or load-shedding will begin,” an Eskom spokesperson said.
“It’s not a decision we take lightly,” he added.
Eskom said in an announcement that “… the unavailability of some of our generating units” had left the power system “severely constrained”.
“We are on track in terms of our planned maintenance schedule and have begun scaling it down to prepare for winter while also managing unplanned outages that add more pressure to an already tight system,” it said.
“Eskom will utilise all necessary emergency resources at its disposal, but should the demand not decrease, load shedding will be implemented as a last resort to protect the national grid from a total shutdown,” it added.
In a separate announcement from Eskom earlier today, interim CEO, Collin Matjila, said he expected either an upward or downward adjustment in the tariff to become effective no later than April 1 2015.
The adjustment was in terms of the regulatory clearing account (RCA) which is administered by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa). The RCA compensates through a tariff adjustment the difference between Eskom’s budgeted costs and revenue against actual figures during the last multi-year price determination from 2010 to 2014 in which a 16% tariff increase per year was granted.
“Such mechanisms are a common feature in electricity regulation worldwide, especially where the generation sector is regulated,” said Matjila.
“We will endeavour to keep all stakeholders especially our customers informed of any developments on NERSA’s decisions on the RCA balance and subsequent tariff adjustments as decisions are made,’ he said.
