S.Africa: ELECTRICITY: Warning about state of disaster — load-shedding will only get worse
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The declaration of a state of disaster over South Africa’s energy crisis won’t help bring new power generation online quickly and won’t soon reduce load-shedding.
That is according to Hohm Energy’s head of business intelligence, Matthew Cruise, in response to President Cyril Ramaphosa’s 2023 state of the nation address on Thursday.
While saying that the previous plan to fix load-shedding remained as is, Ramaphosa also announced that his administration had declared South Africa’s energy crisis a state of disaster due to the severity of load-shedding in recent months.
Cruise joins a chorus of critics— including the Democratic Alliance, Solidarity, and energy expert Chris Yelland — who believe that a state of disaster is not the appropriate way to resolve the energy crisis.
State of disaster opponents are worried that politically-connected individuals will abuse funding for procuring products and services that won’t require Parliamentary oversight or the due process typically followed in such initiatives.
This concern is based on what happened during the Covid-19 pandemic’s state of disaster.
A report by the Auditor-General calculated that around half a trillion rand was stolen through gross overpayments for personal protective equipment and 30,000 relief grant payments that are under investigation.
The PPE procurement and relief grant payments were made possible by measures implemented under the state of disaster.
“I have my concerns about this step, and previously voiced concerns that it won’t do much in terms of actually bringing new generation capacity onto the grid, which is what’s primarily needed in order to meet our electricity demand,” Cruise said.
“Do we know with confidence that the money that flowed from it [a national disaster declaration] was well spent?”
“We know that R500 billion has been investigated for misappropriation or disappearance as a result, so I am concerned about the efficacy of declaring a national disaster. ”
Cruise also has significant doubts about Ramaphosa’s timeline for resolving the energy crisis.
During his speech, the president said Eskom would get additional generation onto the grid within six months.
Ramaphosa also said that the 4,000MW to 6,000MW capacity shortfall causing load-shedding would be closed within 12-18 months.
Cruise said it remains to be seen whether these targets could be met.
In his view, it was “100%” likely there would be no reduction of load-shedding in 2023.
Instead, Cruise contends there will be 50% more load-shedding in 2023 than last year.
2022 was the worst year of load-shedding on record, with over 200 days on which the power cuts were implemented.
Another energy expert, Chris Yelland, previously told MyBroadband that the best-case scenario for load-shedding in 2023 would be that it is at a similar level as last year.
He predicted that stage 3 load-shedding would likely be the most common level experienced during the year but warned it could be worse.
That was based on Eskom’s generating fleet continuing to see a decline in its Energy Availability Factor (EAF), which has repeatedly reached record weekly lows in 2023.
A little bit of good news — once it happens
Cruise also suggested that the 12-18 month timeframe was not coincidental, as South Africa’s next national election is expected to occur by then.
He was excited about one initiative announced by Ramaphosa — helping homes and businesses acquire rooftop solar.
“One of the quickest ways to get power onto the grid is by incentivising the mass public to get solar installations,” he said.
But Cruise said the government previously floated the idea in July 2022, so it would be a case of “wait and see” to find out when it would actually be implemented.
Ramaphosa said that finance minister Enoch Godongwana would reveal more details about a solar tax incentive for businesses and assistance for households during his 2023 budget speech on 22 February.
Cruise said the initial impact of these measures likely be that the experience of load-shedding is alleviated on an individual level, but the rotational power cuts would remain.
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