Eskom took the meaning of Black Friday to an entirely new level with the announcement of Stage 6 loadshedding.
Eskom explains reason behind permanent Stage 6 loadshedding
The ailing power utility released a statement, noting its reasons for hiking up the weekend loadshedding schedule to a permanent Stage 6 until 05:00 on Monday, 27 November 2023.
According to the national electricity supplier, the decision to escalate blackouts was taken after the grid lost “five generating units [in] the past 24 hours.”
In addition, Eskom explained it was left with little choice but to unburden the unstable power grid with heightened loadshedding after exhausting billions in energy reserves that, for the most part, kept South Africa under the hood of Stage 4 blackouts since Wednesday, 22 November 2023.
With Stage 6 loadshedding in place, Eskom forecasts that the grid demand will likely not pass the threshold of 27 206MW. Of course, this is contingent on several factors outside of Eskom’s control, such as unusual weather trends, above-normal power usage and, among others, further breakdowns in generation units.
As of Friday, 24 November 2023, unplanned breakdowns amounted to 15 901MW, while generation capacity out of commission due to maintenance kept more than 5 822MW off the grid.
“Eskom teams are working tirelessly to ensure that this (sp) additional generating units are returned to service as soon as possible,” the power utility wrote.
In Cape Town, the loadshedding schedule for Friday indicates that clients connected to the City’s grid will be at lower stages until 22:00.
See the updated Cape Town loadshedding schedule for Friday below:
Time | Cape Town | Eskom |
00:00 – 05:00 | Stage 4 | Stage 4 |
05:00 – 12:00 | Stage 3 | Stage 6 |
12:00 – 16:00 | Stage 5* | Stage 6* |
16:00 – 20:00 | Stage 4* | Stage 6* |
20:00 – 05:00 | Stage 6* | Stage 6* |