Energy expert Professor Anton Eberhard said serious Eskom errors are to blame for at least five load-shedding stages, according to Daily Investor.
Eberhard is a professor emeritus and senior scholar at the University of Cape Town.
Eberhard highlighted significant failures which caused tremendous damage to Eskom’s generation fleet.
In August 2021, a devastating explosion destroyed Medupi unit 4 after a blunder by the power plant’s staff created a volatile mixture of hydrogen and oxygen.
In September 2022, a fire at a gas air heater at Kusile unit 5 that had not been synchronised to the grid caused significant damage. It delayed bringing the new generation unit online for a year.
In October 2022, a failure on a duct exiting the sulfur dioxide absorber at the Kusile power plant took out three units at the 4,800MW power plant.
Eberhard says that South Africans could expect further delays in the project to extend the lifespan of Koeberg, the nuclear power station.
News24 has reported that the project is running 45 days behind schedule, which means one unit with a 920MW capacity will be unavailable this winter.
Minister of Electricity, Dr Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, said Koeberg would not meet the target to return to service by 23 July 2023.
‘We are going to lose 920MW, which we thought would come on stream by July, when we need it most, in the winter. That is the reality of the situation,” he said.
Eskom said that Medupi unit 4 is estimated to return to service by 31 August 2024.
Eberhard said these are all consequences of severe Eskom errors, which means 4,700MW is offline. ‘It equals five stages of load-shedding’, he said.