South Africa Power Blackouts Jump to Highest Level in a Year

(Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s electricity rationing returned to the highest level for the first time in a year after multiple generating units at the state utility failed, raising questions about the turnaround in the company’s performance.

Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. will implement Stage 6 power cuts — indicating that it will take 6,000 megawatts offline, it said in a post on X. The company, which started enforcing Stage 3 on Saturday, said it had to cut more electricity after additional coal-fired units failed while it had shut almost 7,000 megawatts of capacity for planned maintenance. The utility last resorted to State 6 power cuts on Feb. 10, 2024.

Should the rotational blackouts — known locally as loadshedding — extend, it will hit an economy just recovering in part from the poor performance of the utility. Eskom has made significant repairs to its largely coal-fired fleet of plants that generate more than 80% of South Africa’s electricity, preventing outages for almost a year. 

The power cuts took a significant toll on the economy — as much as 899 million rand ($49 million) per day, according to central bank estimates — and were a big reason why the ruling African National Congress lost its majority in last year’s elections.

The outages, which lasted as many as 12 hours a day, were halted in the weeks before the May national election. Eskom Chief Executive Officer Dan Marokane previously attributed the streak of stable supply to improved maintenance of generation equipment. Better morale at the company and measures to reduce crime and corruption also contributed to the improvement.

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