Eskom has warned the public to brace themselves for persisting stage 4 power cuts after they loss five of their generating units. The announcement of Stage 4 load shedding comes shortly after Stage 2 load shedding was implemented on February 18, leading to power outages in the country.

IT’S NECESSARY 

Eskom said as unfortunate as these measures are they were necessary. "Due to the loss of five generating units at Kendal Power Station and a generating unit at Duvha Power Station, Stage 4 load shedding will be implemented at 4am today until further notice," said the power utility in the statement. Eskom emphasised its commitment to closely monitoring the power system amidst these challenging circumstances.

SPARE SOME ELECTRICITY 

Eskom has also announced that they?ve introduced a Smart Meter load limiting project to manage and optimise electricity consumption during constrained periods. The power utility explained that load limiting is a demand management solution that is used when demand for power exceeds supply, and the grid is constrained. "The programme is gaining great momentum following the implementation of residential load limiting project to 12 500 smart meter customers. When the solution is fully implemented it allows areas with smart meters to be prevented from stage 1 to 4 loadshedding." Benefits of load limiting according to Eskom:

Potential reduction of loadshedding from stage 1 to 4.

Continuation of essential appliances (lights, TV, cellphone and charger).

Assisting the utility to balance the required load against available supply in an effort to reduce the impact of loadshedding.