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Cape Town - Eskom has announced that it will implement stage 2 load shedding on Saturday from 08:00 to 22:00.
"The probability of load shedding is medium to high on Sunday," Eskom tweeted.
"We will use the weekend to build up diesel stocks and dam water levels for open cycle gas turbine plants and pump storage schemes respectively," Eskom said on Twitter.
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"The electricity supply system is very vulnerable due to a shortage of generation capacity as several units are currently out of service due to planned and unplanned outages," Eskom said in a power alert.
"We will review the electricity supply situation in the evening tomorrow and advise electricity users accordingly regarding the prognosis for Sunday," it said.
Eskom called on all customers to reduce the load on the electricity grid by urgently switching off geysers, air conditioners, pool pumps and all non-essential appliances throughout the day, which will reduce electricity demand. Commercial customers, particularly shopping centres and office blocks, can also make a big difference by switching off non-essential lights and not leaving office equipment such as photocopiers and computers in standby mode after hours.
Eskom to cut costs by replacing diesel with gas
The announcement comes after news that Eskom expects to start using gas to run its generators within the next three years.
A spokesperson said on Friday that the cash-strapped utility wanted to move away from using diesel, which is costly.
In his State of the Nation speech on Thursday, President Jacob Zuma directed Eskom to switch to gas to cut down on the spiralling costs of using diesel.
IDC's coal mine, energy plans could lift Eskom
South Africa’s state-owned development finance institution says it is looking at investing in more coal mines to support the national power utility Eskom’s coal-fired plants.
The Industrial Development Corporation’s divisional executive of mining and manufacturing industries Abel Malinga said ways were being sought to “diversity the energy mix” in South Africa “and we have invested a lot of money in renewable energy”.
