Date: Apr 09, 2019
Eskom appealed to consumers on Monday to use electricity sparingly as colder weather is expected to increase the risk of load-shedding during the week.
“With colder weather expected across the country and the demand of electricity projected to increase, the power system is forecast to be tight for this week,” said the power utility.
“The winter plan indicates a higher demand, with three days being extremely tight, with a high risk of load-shedding.
“South Africans can make a huge difference by rallying towards the common cause of using electricity efficiently, having the collective potential of reducing demand by up to 500MW and saving the equivalent of one unit at a power station.”
Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan said at an electricity briefing last week that if all went according to plan, there would either be no load-shedding – or stage 1 “at the most” – provided that Eskom’s turnaround plan was implemented “110%”.
Consumers endured days of stage 4 load-shedding in March.
