We hope you haven’t been taking your electricity-filled days for granted because that period of peace has officially come to an end. That’s right, daytime load shedding is back. Stage 2, to be specific, the power-denier announced at 6:10 this morning on Twitter.
Hold your groans ‘til the end, please.
Wednesday, 28 June 2023: Due to the delay in returning to service some generating units , Stage 2 loadshedding will be implemented today at 07:00 until 16:00. Thereafter, Stage 3 loadshedding will be implemented from 16:00 until midnight.
Eskom will…
— Eskom Hld SOC Ltd (@Eskom_SA) June 28, 2023
What the “full update” will entail; we can’t be sure. If we had to hazard a guess, it’ll probably bring forth the return of ‘indefinite’ load shedding for the foreseeable future. It’ll hopefully also provide some more insight into why some of Eskom’s generating units are suffering delays.
According to EskomSePush, the country has undergone 3,824 hours (or 159 days) of load shedding in 2023 alone. We’re expecting that number to shoot up over the next couple of days – especially if Stages 2 and 3 are sticking around indefinitely.
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And if you were counting on the recently announced plans to restore three of Kusile’s generating units to pull us out of this hell… don’t. While the Department of Fisheries, Forests, and the Environment has granted the suspension of the Minimum Emission Standards rules, Eskom may only have those generating units back online by November at the earliest.
