R200m substation upgrade to be complete in time for World Cup #Eskom

R200m substation upgrade to be complete in time for World Cup.

The R200-million ugrade of the Acacia substation, in Cape Town, which forms part of State-owned power utility Eskom’s R426-billion capacity expansion programme, is expected to be complete by May 2010. The upgrade will ensure reliable electricity supply during the FIFA soccer World Cup and beyond, says Eskom.

The required power generation from the Acacia substation exceeded its firm capacity (guaranteed power supply) of 500 MVA. The maximum load of 694 MVA, measured in 2006, at the substation, exceeded the transformer firm capacity by 194 MVA. Acacia’s 500-MVA firm capacity was calculated from the existing two 500-MVA 400/132-kV transformers.

The substation’s upgrade includes the extension of a 132-kV transformer to accommodate two feeder bays and one transformer bay and the installation of a third 500-MVA 400/132-kV transformer.

Meanwhile, the utility’s five-year capacity expansion programme aims to meet South Africa’s rising electricity demand. Eskom has allocated 13% of the R426-billion approved capacity expansion budget to upgrading South Africa’s transmission network. A further 73% has been allocated to electricity generation projects, while the balance of the budget will fund improvements to the distribution network and efforts to diversify South Africa’s energy sources, says Eskom.

Part of the electricity tarriff increases, 24,8% from April 1, 25,8% from April 1, 2011, and 25,9% from April 1, 2012, which were recently granted to Eskom by the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) will assist in funding the utility’s R426-billion capacity expansion programme.

The current budget for the capacity expansion programme should last until March 2013, but it is expected to grow to more than R1-trillion by 2025.

Meanwhile, the upgrade of the Johannesburg North substation should be complete by October 2010. The utility reports that this upgrade involves the commissioning of four transformers and is progressing, as three transformers have already been commissioned.

Other transmission projects include the 400-kV strengthening of the Nelson Mandela Bay area, as wel as the 275-kV and 400-kV strengthening in the Polokwane area that is expected to be complete by the end of 2010. The 765-kV strengthening (operated at 400 kV) of the Empangeni area is expected to be complete by the end of 2011. While the 765-kV project from the Zeus substation, in Mpumalanga province, to the Omega substation, near the Koeberg nuclear power station, in the Western Cape, covering about 1 450 km, is expected to be complete by mid-2012. The work involved includes the upgrading of substations and the installation of new transformers.

The Limpopo-province-based Medupi power station 400-kV integration and the 400-kV integration of the Ingula power station, which borders the Free State and Kwazulu-Natal, are expected to be complete by the end of 2013. Further, the 400-kV network into Mthatha, in the Eastern Cape, is scheduled to be complete by mid-2012.

Eskom says that other major transmission projects completed in 2009 include a new 400-kV transmission line and three new substations to strengthen the supply to the Platinum basin, a collective name for the platinum-and-chrome-mining industry in Rustenburg, Brits and Polokwane.

“Work on the Vaal strengthening scheme, which involves the upgrading of eight substations in the West Rand and Vaal areas, is also progressing, with four of the stations already more than 50% complete,” the company reports.

The progress on these projects has been generally good, says Eskom; however, owing to financial constraints, certain project plans have been put on hold for six to nine months. Other major constraints have been the lack of access to sites, because of problems with landowners and ongoing network outage cancellations, as well as unusually wet weather conditions that prevent contractors from working.

Electricity Supply to Neighbouring African Countries

Eskom currently sells and imports electricity to and from neighbouring African countries. It has long-term agreements with some industrial end-users who provide firm power. The agreements with African regional utilities are a mixture of firm agreements and nonfirm agreements.

Eskom has agreements with Namibia, Swaziland, Lesotho, Botswana and Mozambique. Zimbabwe and Zambia are also trading partners, but, because of the nature of the agreements and the energy constraints in South Africa, Eskom does not currently sell to them.

“The majority of agreements have escalation clauses linked to the tariff increases promulgated by Nersa. These countries will, therefore, also experience tariff increases in line with South African customers,” Eskom’s media desk confirmed with Engineering News.

The company exports power to neighbouring countries and imports from them as a member of the Southern African Power Pool, which was founded in 1995. Eskom says that neighbouring countries have a relatively small demand for electricity, which makes it uneconomic to invest in generation capacity. Some neighbours rely on imported power to supplement between 50% and 80% of their electricity needs.

“Such situations cannot be quickly reversed and the sudden removal of such levels of power would have a crippling effect on these countries’ economies, with a knock-on effect for the regional economy, including South Africa.”

Eskom explains that many of these countries have considerable coal resources or hydroelectric potential and, hence, present attractive electricity-generation opportunities for the future. As South Africa’s domestic electricity demand grows and production costs increase, there is growing potential for electricity imports into the country, par- ticularly from hydrostations as renewable energy will help reduce South Africa’s overall dependence on coal.

The company says that the issue of power exports has been of concern to South African customers, particularly with the recent power supply constraints. Therefore, power shortages have prompted Eskom to modify its role in order to increase imports and decrease exports.

“However, because of the relative size of the level of net exports, ceasing exports and losing imports would not result in a material difference in the current energy situation in South Africa. The short-term response has been to maintain purchases from our neighbouring States and reduce sales as much as possible,” the company states.

Edited by: Brindaveni Naidoo

SA needs to make ‘urgent’ power supply decisions in 2010 – Dames

SA needs to make ‘urgent’ power supply decisions in 2010 – Dames.

South Africa had to make “urgent decisions” this year to ensure the security of energy supply in the next 20 years, Eskom chief officer for generation Brian Dames said on Monday.

Addressing a National Union of Mineworkers energy forum in Johannesburg, he said that the country would have to continue building new capacity, while also investing in other technologies than coal.

According to some plans Eskom had devised, nuclear should contribute about 14,4% of the country’s electricity supply by 2028, with existing power generation units contributing 41% and new coal-fired power stations about 10,7%.

Dames further highlighted that power conservation could no longer be a choice in South Africa and that it should be mandatory.

Meanwhile, finance director Paul O’Flaherty emphasised that Eskom had to commit to completing the Medupi and Kusile coal-fired power stations, as well as the Ingula pumped-storage project.

He noted that it was important for Eskom to obtain the R190-billion funding shortfall it was still facing for the next seven years, as the power utility could not afford to become insolvent.

He added that to stop the construction of the Kusile power plant now would be a waste of money, in terms of what had already been committed on the project.

Also, while Eskom understood concerns from environmental groups around the $3,7-billion World Bank loan, O’Flaherty said that it was not helping the power utility, as it could impact on its credit ratings and subsequently its ability to raise capital.

Dames added that the World Bank loan would also support renewable energy and environmental protection, as some of the funds would go towards building the largest wind farm in South Africa and the largest concentrated solar power plant in the country.

The Witness, PMB, #SANews #Eskom – Loadshedding Continues – thanks World Bank for giving Eskom the R29billion loan

The Witness.

Messages after the capital city and surrounding areas (and other parts of the country) were left without any form of electricity supply for 27 hours from 20-21 April 2010…. Sheeeeeeeeeesh! That’s a lot longer than the regular (Scheduled but unnotified) load-shedding of between 3 and 8 hours per day… #IDontLoveEskom – but this was as a result of blown up sub-stations that have not been maintained or upgraded for the last 12-15 years and because Eskom employees have decided to join in the Nationwide Municpal Strike they decided they were not going to fix the sub-stations…

Now we ask ourselves the questions, the kids and I were chatting about it this evening while camping my the bedroom around a bunch of candles…

We often say “What did we do before motor cars?” “What did we do before refined sugar?”  Tonight we asked outselves “What did we do AFTER Eskom?  The answer was “Started living like cavemen while paying increased monthly service rates for a service we are not receiving, stocking up on candles, charcoal so that we can at least eat warm food (Gas is too expensive) etc etc…”

As I write this the streets are lined with litter because of the Municipal strike, the stench as you drive past some areas is unbearable; Refuse removal remains unremoved (we don’t get rebates)……….

Burst water pipes remain burst and water gets wasted ( we have apparently less than 6 months’ supply of water in South Africa- and that was before winter) ………

Defrosted food in refrigerators and deep freezes are lost… Insurance cmpanies now indemnify themselves against losses due load-edhedding or Eskom related claims….  Some people living in outer areas are losing an entire month’s worth of groceries which they cal ill afford at the current rate of increase at 5% PER MONTH – and they have no recourse…….

Chaos is the new word for traffic as traffic systems cease to function, accidents – some fatal – occur per the minute,  ummmm Municipal Traffic Officers, where are you to re-direct the traffic?

Banks cannot operate, ecause even with generators, Telkom, also owned by the Government, can not get their systems up and running….

Schools all but shut down, as electricial equipment cannot be used, microphones, telephone systems, computers –  nothing can be used… The exhorbitantly expensive fees paid to public schools don’t get refunded….

Eskom stated in their application to the World Bank for their loan that certain households receive free electricity… <- NO ONE IN SOUTH AFRICA HAS HEARD OF THIS…. the majority receive cheaper electricity and if they refuse to pay they do not get dosconnected simply because they will either stone the contractors going to disconnect, barricade the roads with burning tyres and refuse, stone the motor vehicles, and/or assault, kill intimidate and threaten the contractors… SO THEY GET IT FOR FREE…..

The Airline terminals are – well let’s just say —->>>> DON’T FLY HERE!  Chaos there currently at South Africa’s only 2 itnternational airports, Johannesburg and Cape Town, which are non-functional at the best of times with incompetent token-appointment staff who barely speak English – if at all, and are far more intent on stuffing their faces with whatever they can get into their mouths, than attempting to even try and explain that “uhh hellooo we have no power – we cannot help you… no we cannot tell you anything.. just stand there and wait..”  One woman has been waiting for 2 days to return to London…

The Municipal strike is said to take another 2 weeks before it is over, if their demands are not met.. not sure what the demands are…  Current news is that it should be over by tomorrow… At what cost to the econoy? The threat is that if their demands are not met the Word Cup will experience countrywide outages throughout the tournaments.. something to look forward to…

Some comments taken from a local newspaper at how power outages, scheduled or unscheduled affect the populace, and the exhorbitant (and rising) costs of paying for Eskom services that are not being received… But beware – DO NOT PAY YOUR ACCOUNT ONE DAY LATE… your service will be disconnected, and this is done via private contractors at the electrcity poles…..

Thank you World Bank (against the advice of the US Treasury) for supplying Eskom with the R29 blillion loan last week that South Africans and the world fought so hard against.  Do you HONESTLY think that any of that money will find its way into trying to improve the country’s (non-)economy?  Who do you think is actually going to repay this loan?  The South African consumer cannot afford the current bills… Entire businesses are shut down daily – for days sometimes – the staff have nothing to do, the businesses are shutting down at hundreds a day…. Why can the world not see this? WHY NOT?

Load shedding: SMS responses

Readers

Eskom Load Shedding:
Readers respond. Some comments have been edited.

One specific outage, on 27 September, impacted very badly on my life and has left me with medical costs which I can ill afford.
A month before that I had a successful shoulder operation which healed so well. I work on the 5th floor of the Dept of Transport and when the electricity went off, I had to walk down 164 steps to get to the ground floor.
Because of polio as a child, my knees are very weak and I have to use my arms up or down stairs.
Because there were only rails on the right side of the stairs, I had to use my injured arm to assist me. Much difficulty and pain later, I was on the ground floor, but unbeknown to me this descent caused extreme damage to the operated shoulder. Four months later and I am still in severe pain and my specialist has suggested another operation.
Who is going to pay for this?
Marlena de Villiers

Firstly, government was warned over eight years ago by two internationally recognised experts, of the problem of increased demand, and chose to ignore it. So once again our government has demonstrated its incompetence. Secondly, if large employers are penalised, their employees won’t have electricity to go home to, because unless this situation is resolved, they may not have jobs in the future.  Thirdly, small businesses are bearing the brunt of this fiasco and in certain parts of the country many have had to close their doors, bringing a negative impact on employment.  Lastly, the Public Protector has been slow off the mark. He should have jumped all over Eskom long time ago.  I only wish the people of this country could follow the American example and bring a class action lawsuit against both Eskom and the government. It is high time the South African consumer stopped adopting such a passive stance to situations such as this.
I hope FIFA are taking note of this diabolical situation.
Paul Dorian

It is sad that the lives of many South Africans are affected because of “so called demand”. Why don’t Eskom enforce the mega companies to close their production plants during peak hours and let the masses go home to electricity, or is there too much money at stake. Eskom is drawing power from the poor and supplying to the rich. Am I wrong? I thought the MCB charges we have to pay were to prevent this situation? Perhaps we should revisit the payment of this tax. Who has been using the revenue collected for purposes other than for those intended or where is this mountain of money stashed? Where do Eskom’s profits go if not into building up resources and infrastructure?
A. Kidson

Can’t the Msunduzi Municipality not provide us with a better service and publish help lines too! After all, what is the use of Internet if there is no power! A daily print out of load shedding on the front page of The Natal Witness and other daily newspapers would be more practical.
Sue Drummond

My biggest problem is that the times that Eskom give do not coincide with the actual load shedding.  We received eight identical smses on Tuesday to let us know that we will be experiencing load shedding on Monday. The times they gave were completely wrong.  We had 3 different intervals on Monday adding up to 7 hours in total. The first one was at Breakfast 06h30 to 08h00, the second at lunch 11h55 to 15h00, and the third between 18h00 and 20h30. How do I feed my kids?

It is sad when the country was warned years ago to build more power stations and nothing was done. Today we pay the price. Really there is nothing the public can do. Anything we say will fall on deaf†ears. But one thing we can do is oppose stupid comments like there are not enough resources from the traffic department to put more officers on points duty. You need to look at the Manning Road/Royston Road intersection. There you will see about 10 traffic cars, all parked on the grass verge and one at the corner of East Street. What are they doing there? Waiting for the odd motorist that rounds the slip way and he gets caught up the road. Yet you will see no traffic vehicles in Langalibalele Street. You only need to see how these kombi taxis are driven, every traffic rule is broken. The same applies to Moses Mabida Road. You donít see any traffic vehicles. You know if these officers are visible then drivers will be more patient on the roads. The statement Kenneth Chetty is making is unacceptable. He needs to take a drive around the city to see for himself.  Load shedding is causing enough problems. We need to take note of all the foodstuffs we have in our freezers as these will begin to go off very soon. Who will compensate the house holder?
Ganson

On moving to Pietermaritzburg in 1987 I was informed by our local Municipality that it was compulsory to have the “Domestic Single Phase Amp” switch installed in the electricity meter box attached to my house. The Municipal officials kindly told me that it was to help me†SAVE electricity.  †Today, this switch costs me R191,52 per month. If my neighbours and all the rest of the residents in the Msunduzi Municipal Area are doing their “thing” (don’t forget it is compulsory to have this switch) in SAVING electricity, PLEASE† can† some one tell me why , we as residents of the “City of Choice” are having to join in with the power cuts and load sharing? As it is clearly visible to all that this switch does not work, can I please have a refund?
Pennie Pelser

Suggestions
1 Plan the Outages so they occur at the same time on the same day in each area, so people can prepare ahead.
2 Put qualified competent Managers in the relevant Departments. 3 The Witness publishes the time and place of the outages for that day on the front page. (Which are never adhered to and o longer occur)  Eskom advise the people how long the outage will last, if possible a  fixed period for each area, so the inconvenience can be shared equally among the population . I understand there are certain areas that have never had an  outage.
W.T. Bright

10. My husband and I live in Howick, and our power goes off without any warning sometimes twice a day. Howick itself does not get mentioned at all on the Internet or in the Witness load shedding schedules. We have invested in a couple of long life lamps, so at least we can read, if nothing else.
Mrs Colleen Brand

I think it is totally unacceptable that load shedding of residential properties is done in the evenings when families are at home trying to feed, bath, do homework etc. residential load shedding should take place between hours of business e.g. 8am – 5pm as most homes are vacant and will not be affected.  Businesses should be shut down in the middle of the night or late evening. Eskom was awarded billions of rands years ago to rectify the matter and now they must pay the consequences and pay overtime to their workers. We are told Eskom will not be held responsible for any loss or damages, as a business owner, we may end up loosing our homes, cars etc. We are unable to operate our business when load shedding takes place as we cannot utilise computers, credit card facilities, complete demonstrations and the list goes on. We cannot expect staff to travel home for a couple of hours and come back when the power is on, so therefore we have to pay people to be idle. Why do the powers that be at Eskom not think long and hard before taking on such a serious matter, consider the lives they are affecting. Perhaps the fat cats were issued with generators so do they actually give a continental!!
I agree with a previous comment made about a class action lawsuit against the Government and Eskom.
Anon

As a temporary measure, and until the power crisis has been resolved, may I suggest the introduction of a†fixed amount at the standard tariff for each household and†when this is exceeded a much higher tariff is charged. This will discourage extravagant use and thereby make more electricity available for essential services, business, traffic lights etc.
Joan Osborne

We are going back to the dark ages — excuse the pun
Anon

Some of the SMS responses

Switch off the total country for 5 to10 minutes at 9.00 pm every night! Everybody wins.

ESKOM should be fined for poor service and lack of maintenance . High salaried officials should have salary cuts as they are not performing as required .

Surely with all the power shedding we should be paying less for our electricity bills not more. Does Eskom or the municipality think of that? Why are the
street lights left on all day?

Does Lidgetton have to have load shedding 2 times a day. Farms and many businesses here? We cannot afford generators !

It is frustrating. Why not send the whole city on lunch at noon switch off for a hour or two. Remember the entire city will stand still, what a save! Businesses will plan better. Quinton Brien

Advertise load shedding schedules in the witness, not everyone has access 2 internet or a phone. Y is ur electricity bill hiking when all this load shedding occuring

It would be easy to sort out the Eskom power problem: just FIRE ESKOM’S CEO, and employ a Private Company from abroad to replace Eskom. DISGRUNTLED

Eskom is now giving Citizens yet another reason to leave the Country permanently! DISGRUNTLED

Multichoice will lose customers due to load shedding by Eskom – I hope they sue them for every customer who cancels their subscribtion! DISGRUNTLED One wonders what FIFA thinks of the alleged service delivery in this third world backwater?

my suggestion to eskom is for them to do their† load shedding at night say after 23h00 till 04h00 the following day,that is do a complete shut down then have enough power during normal working hours

percy xaba