In the wake of the worst load-shedding yet in 2023, many energy experts believed that Eskom’s ageing coal-powered-generating fleet was doomed and would only perform worse every year., EE Business Intelligence head and reputed energy expert Chris Yelland anticipated a less gloomy outlook for load-shedding in the year than in 2023.
The EAF has remained over 60% for the past six weeks, all of which have gone by without any load-shedding. While there is still a long way to go before the end of the year, Eskom would have to really sink to new lows for load-shedding to be worse than in 2023. As it stands, Eskom can still afford 89 days of load-shedding in 2023 to match the amount of power cuts in 2022.
In addition, Eskom is expected to return a further 2,540MW of capacity to the grid by the fourth quarter of the year, further improving the EAF and outlook for load-shedding.