By News24Wire
Cape Town – While we should all be pleased that Eskom successfully performed the first part of its planned maintenance drive without load shedding since April 24, electricity consumers should be cautious of becoming too optimistic, energy expert Chris Yelland warned on Tuesday. 
He told Fin24 the fact that there was no load shedding over the long weekend was not unexpected, because demand was particularly low over the weekend.
“I am grateful for all and any maintenance that Eskom can do, and grateful also for fact that there was no load shedding, but we need to be cautious as the deep maintenance that is necessary requires a shutdown of a generator for anything from 3 to 6 weeks; 3 days of relatively superficial maintenance is not enough,” he said.
“The problem cannot be solved overnight and it requires major investment.”
Eskom’s acting Chief Executive Brian Molefe said in a statement on Tuesday the maintenance teams were able to perform planned maintenance on 2 303 MW of generating plant over the long weekend. They also returned 1 643 MW of generating capacity back to service. – Fin24
