Stage 2 loadshedding: ‘Eskom gives excuses but no clarity’ – energy expert

702 and CapeTalk’s Africa Melane speaks with Matthew Cruise, an energy expert at IMPOWER.

Listen below:

Stage two load shedding has made an unwelcome return as we head into the colder winter months.

Eskom says this is due to delays in returning over 3,000 megawatts of generation capacity to the grid, and more than 1,300 megawatts in fresh, unplanned breakdowns.

The power utility has insisted that it is better prepared to manage electricity demand this winter, but South Africans are unsure what they can realistically expect.

Cruise says Eskom has not been giving much detail about what is happening at the power stations that have not come back online.

“Unfortunately, what we are starting to see is continuous excuses or reasons given by Eskom, but not really any clarity on when the situation is going to be resolved.”

- Matthew Cruise, Energy expert - IMPOWER

“I see this as a sign of how things will be happening going forward.”

- Matthew Cruise, Energy expert - IMPOWER

RELATED: BREAKING NEWS: Eskom implements stage 2 loadshedding

Eskom stated that we would need to stay below 13,000 MW of unplanned outages to avoid winter loadshedding, but we have already passed 15,000 MW.

Cruise predicts we could see between stage two and stage four loadshedding throughout winter.

Scroll up to the audio player to listen to the interview for more.