City Power wants residents to limit own usage - or face remote switchoffs

City Power is planning interventions it hopes can avert load-shedding between Eskom's stages one to three for Johannesburg residents.

These include a new load limiting system and expanded ripple control at sub-stations, while the entity explores sources of alternative energy generation to supplement supply from Eskom.

City Power CEO Tshifularo Mashava said: “Load-limiting means instead of you having the luxury of your geyser, stove and air conditioner on at the same time, it will be limited to use - and we will give you a choice of which ones to switch off.”

The entity is planning to acquire gadgets that will allow them to see what electrical appliances people are using, and communicate with its customers to limit the load.

“The customer will be able to make a decision of 'what is it that I am able to give up at this point and time.'

“This could be switching off a geyser, depending on the extent of load reduction we are asking for, or it could be a stove, it could be an air conditioner."

Should customers not comply, their electricity will trip within 30 second intervals on a five times cycle, and eventually goes off for 30 minutes until customers comply and switch off their high electricity usage appliances.

“We will run that literally for everyone at the same time, then it will allow us to be able to give Eskom the megawatts that they require from a load-shedding perspective without us actual doing load-shedding, but rather doing load-limiting,” she said.

When the load-shedding stages escalate to high stages, they would definitely need to load-shed but this would at least be load-shedding at lower stages.

“That is the benefit. We are already in winter, winter is upon us, and it is for that reason that we are doing what we can to fast-track our plans. Our proof of concept is done, and I think it is just a matter of rolling out,” she said.  

The utility will also revamp its ripple relay system. This regulates geyser temperatures and allows City Power to remotely switch the electricity supply to the geysers on and off.

Mashava said the plans would bring relief to residents as they’ve had many complaints from their customers that they couldn’t use electricity as they are usually load-shed in the morning and in the evening during peak time when they want to use electricity.  

“We have prepared new schedules, and those schedules are currently under discussion and the MMC will be signing those off,” she said, adding that as soon as they are signed off, they would announce when they are starting with less duration and less frequency of load-shedding, from stage one all the way to stage eight.  

“But for a project of this magnitude, we envisage a six-month period for it to actually being in completion – so unfortunately we are only starting during winter, which means we will get some of these benefits more during the summer months.  

“The good news is that these are not ideas, these are not plans, these are actually at an execution phase,” she said.  

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