Watch: Eskom ramping up maintenance to “significantly reduce” the risk of loadshedding by September 2021

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By Liesl Smit


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Eskom CEO Andre De Ruyter says there has been a marked improvement in the performance of the power network with a focus on continued maintenance, but he has warned that due to the ageing fleet of power stations, a shortfall in generation capacity is looming, as some of these units reach the end of their design lives, and will soon have to be decommissioned.

De Ruyter says they are also working hard on ramping up the power utility’s Reliability Maintenance Programme, which will hopefully reduce the risk of loadshedding significantly by September next year.

De Ruyter and his team briefed the media today on the State of the Eskom System.

He has welcomed government’s recent call to add additional capacity to the grid.

“The looming shortfall from a generational capacity that we’re very grateful for is Nersa’s concurrence with Minister Mantashe’s determination of a procurement process to add 11.8 GW to the grid. We think that this is urgent.”

Liesl Smit
Liesl Smit
Liesl is the Smile 90.4FM News Manager. She has been at Smile since 2016, with nearly 20 years experience in the radio industry, including reading news, field reporting and producing. In 2008 she won the Vodacom Journalist of the Year Award, Western Cape region. liesl@smile904.fm

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