Eskom accused of implementing Stage 5 load shedding “and lying about it”
Ted Blom has highlighted that Eskom claimed to have taken 4 900MW off the grid on Monday – which would equal a Stage 5 round of load shedding.
Just hours after Pravin Gordhan and Jabu Mabuza pleaded with South Africans to have patience with Eskom over the load shedding debacle, the utility may very well be on their way to dropping the biggest hammer blow of them all in the near future.
A report in Fin24 claims that Eskom and the government have started planning for Stage 5 and Stage 6 load shedding, according to officials.
What is Stage 5 load shedding and Stage 6 load shedding?
Stage 5 load shedding would involve 15 blocks of power cuts over a four-day period, taking a maximum of 5000MW off the grid. Stage 6 would crank the blackouts up to a limit of 18, over that same amount of time, removing up to 6000MW from the grid.
The devil here, is in the detail. Note that the maximum you can implement for each stage corresponds with the value. So, for example, 4000MW is the highest possible value Eskom can remove and still class it as Stage 4.
However, according to an Eskom official, they took 4 900MW off the grid on Monday, which is a value that belongs in the Stage 5 bracket. Their statement was made during the press briefing earlier this morning:
(We’ve come with the receipts. Watch from 22:52 onwards)
“To supplement for Stage 4 load shedding yesterday, we had utitlise what we had and that gave us 4 900MW”
Eskom caught in the act?
To interpret this statement, we spoke to senior energy analyst Ted Blom. He’s been the main voice holding Eskom to account over the past few years and has found himself to be a very busy man in 2019.
He lambasted the company for lying to the public and said they had implemented Stage 5 without telling anyone. We probably don’t need to tell you that Blom refuses to mince his words, and this occasion was no different:
“They lied to us in their presentation. They mentioned they dropped 4 900MW when the most they can remove for Stage 4 is 4000MW. They have put Stage 5 in place and lied to everyone. That is what was stated to us categorically.
Officially speaking, we are in a rotation of Stage 4 load shedding until 23:00 on Tuesday, before Stage 2 load shedding is likely to take place overnight again. Blom’s fury perhaps speaks for the masses on this one. These recent cuts have been the deepest, as “round-the-clock” blackouts have inconvenienced South Africans all across the country.
Eskom, seemingly, have gotten used to working in the dark.