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Risk of loadshedding remains for Friday evening - Eskom

While the power system remains "extremely constrained and vulnerable", Eskom will try not to implement loadshedding on Friday evening and over the weekend.

In an early-evening update Eskom said it will only implement loadshedding on Friday evening if absolutely necessary due to any changes in the current situation.

However, given the additional loss of units with unplanned breakdowns and the need to replenish emergency reserves, the probability of loadshedding remains, it warned, but will only be implemented if absolutely necessary.

"We remind customers that any unexpected shift, such as additional unplanned breakdowns or the unavailability of diesel for our open cycle gas turbines or water levels at pumped storage schemes, could result in loadshedding at short notice," said Eskom.

Early on Friday morning the power system was also described as "tight and vulnerable" and with a high risk of rotational power cuts later in the day.

This came after the power utility terminated stage 2 load shedding at 05:00 on Friday morning after it suddenly announced load shedding as from 22:00 on Thursday evening.

This was because on Thursday it lost three additional generation units and had to use its emergency reserves in order to meet demand throughout the day.

Eskom said in a statement that it would need to continue to replenish both its water levels at pumped storage schemes and diesel for its open cycle gas turbines over the weekend in order to be in a better position to "stabilise for the week ahead".

Fin24 reported earlier that, after some of Eskom's generating units failed over last weekend, power supply was running dangerously low by Wednesday morning.

Unplanned outages above 9 500 MW mean Eskom has to resort to emergency power generation by using open cycle gas turbines and pumped-storage hydroelectric plants.

These are very expensive ways of generating power, particularly the gas turbines, which require large quantities of diesel.

Find your loadshedding schedule here.

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