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Massive blackouts imminent?Mon, 29 Jul 2013 8:42 AM



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Peak demand on July 25 may have exceeded power capacity‚ meaning there was no capacity margin‚ says Eskom in its latest system bulletin.
The state-owned utility estimates that peak demand was 35‚207 megawatts (MW)‚ while available capacity was 35‚200MW.
The international benchmark is to have spare capacity of 15 percent‚ which means that Eskom should have 5‚280MW more capacity available. However‚ Eskom has only managed to add 391MW per year over the past four years.
The state-owned utility warned on July 8 that delays to the new Medupi power station would mean that the first unit would only be connected to the grid in the second half of 2014.
The delays at Medupi means that Eskom will not be able to reduce planned maintenance to its normal winter practice of below 2‚000MW‚ as the ageing power plants have been run hard for the past three years as new capacity has not kept pace with demand.
The delays at Medupi‚ along with those at its Kusile and Ingula power stations‚ are partly the reason why economic growth for 2013 is expected to slow to 2 percent from 2.5 percent in 2012 and 3.1 percent in 2011 as Eskom buys back power from ferrochrome producers and cuts power to large users such the mines and aluminium smelters.
The lack of spare electricity capacity and the more than doubling in the price of electricity is also one of the reasons why AccelorMittal SA (ACL) shut down its electric arc furnaces in October 2012.
In 2012 South African steel production fell by 5.7 percent to only 7.12-million tons‚ its lowest level since at least 1980. This contrasts with a 1.2 percent rise in global steel production in 2012 after an 8.1 percent jump in 2011.
The reason there was no power margin on Thursday was that planned maintenance jumped to 4‚600MW on July 25 compared with 3‚502MW on July 22 and 2‚917MW on July 18.
Unplanned outages eased to 3‚300MW on July 25 from 3‚400MW on July 22 and 2‚900MW on July 18.
The unplanned outages on Thursday compared with 2013’s low of 2‚450MW on June 6 and peak of 7‚657MW on April 22.
So far in 2013‚ there have been only seven updates when unplanned outages have been below Eskom’s internal benchmark of having no more than 3‚600MW out of service due to unplanned outages.
Eskom failed to achieve its internal benchmark more than 60 percent of the time in 2012.
The last time it achieved this benchmark prior to June was on November 29 2012.