Eskom has warned that it could implement load-shedding at short notice after all five running units at Kriel power station tripped on Monday morning.
“During the early hours of this morning, there were two electrical faults in quick succession in the high voltage yard at Kriel Power Station,” the state-owned power utility explained.
“The fault, which appears to be related to the heavy mist conditions experienced at the time, is under investigation.”
Eskom said the first fault caused units 1, 2 and 3 of the power station to trip, while the second fault tripped units 4 and 5. Unit 6 was already offline.
“The incident removed more than 2,000MW of generation capacity from the network,” said Eskom.
Two thousand megawatts represent two stages of load-shedding.
“While some generation units at other power stations are expected to return to service during the day, these will take time to load to full capacity,” the utility said.
“Should there be any further loss of generation capacity during the day, or some units fail to return to service as anticipated, load-shedding may be required to be implemented at short notice.”
Eskom said it currently has 1,018MW offline on planned maintenance, while another 17,022MW of capacity is unavailable due to breakdowns.
“Eskom’s teams are working hard to return as many of the units to service as possible,” it said.
“Eskom would like to remind the public that load-shedding is implemented only as a last resort to protect the national grid.
“We therefore urge all South Africans to continue using electricity sparingly, especially during these uncertain times on the power system.”
Source: My Broadband
