Eskom again takes load-shedding responsibility from Ekurhuleni

Eskom will from Friday resume direct load-shedding of Ekurhuleni customers after the city's repeated failure to adhere to the agreed-upon code of practice. 

Eskom said the code of practice requires electricity distribution licence-holders to reduce load during the declaration of a system emergency. It said the recurrence of Eskom taking over load-shedding in Ekurhuleni followed an analysis which showed the municipality did not reduce the load as required by the code. 

“Eskom brought to the attention of the city, on numerous occasions, its failure to load-shed its customers in keeping with the agreed regulations,” said Eskom.

In July last year, Eskom took back the role of load-shedding Ekurhuleni customers.

 However, the city asked Eskom to hand back the implementation of load-shedding to the municipality with a commitment to honour the requirements of the code of practice.

“While Eskom appreciates the city’s technical limitations in executing load-shedding, it has little option but to implement load-shedding on behalf of the city as the noncompliance puts further strain on the already stretched national grid,” said Eskom. 

Eskom said failure to implement load-shedding when required by all electricity distributors, including municipalities, undermined the integrity and stability of the grid, which could lead to higher stages of load-shedding.

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