PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa has announced a raft of measures to fix Eskom in a desperate bid to prevent load-shedding, saying the shortage of electricity remained a huge constraint on economic growth and job creation in the country.
He said these key measures were preferable to declaring a state of disaster or even emergency, as some have suggested.
The president was addressing the nation on his administration’s plans to fix the country’s energy crisis.
Ramaphosa said, among others, skilled personnel are being sourced locally and from abroad, including former Eskom staff to help with generation issues at the power utility.
Other measures announced by Ramaphosa include, allowing private households to generate solar power and sell it back into the grid, procurement of additional baseload capacity from renewables and gas and accelerating private sector involvement in energy generation.
The president further announced the establishment of a National Energy Crisis Committee involving the Departments of Energy, Public Enterprises, Environment, Treasury and Police to deal with the energy problems the country has experienced.
He said it is now been decided that over the next 12 months, Eskom will increase the budget allocated for critical maintenance to increase the reliability of its generation capacity.
“We are cutting red tape that has made it difficult for Eskom to buy maintenance spares and equipment within the required period to effect repairs,” said Ramaphosa.
He added that one of the challenges that Eskom has faced has been the shortage of skilled personnel and engineers.
The utility, he said, was now recruiting skilled personnel, including former senior Eskom plant managers and engineers from the private sector.
“These skilled personnel will support various personnel and help to ensure that world-class operating and maintenance procedures are reinstated,” he said.
“Over the next three months, Eskom will take additional actions to add new generation capacity to the grid on an urgent basis.”
He said his administration has already taken important steps to increase generation capacity and diversify energy supply in South Africa.
“One of the first steps we took to address the electricity shortfall was to revive the renewable energy procurement programme in 2018,” said Ramaphosa.
Since then, over 2,000 MW of solar and wind power has been connected to the grid through Bid Window 4 of the programme.
A further 2,600 MW of capacity has been procured through Bid Window 5, which will begin to add capacity from early 2024, he said.
“We have started to diversify generation by allowing parties other than Eskom to generate electricity,” he said.
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