<\/p>\n
Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa is confident that they will continue to have lower stages of load shedding as the system recovers.<\/p>\n
However, Ramokgopa said with the country getting out of the winter period the demand for energy will be lower.<\/p>\n
He said the demand for energy was 33 000MW and this has come down to 28 000MW.<\/p>\n
Ramokgopa, who was briefing the media on the state of electricity in the country on Sunday, said power stations continued to perform better.<\/p>\n
This has been reflected in the increase in the energy availability factor from 48% to 60%.<\/p>\n
Things will get better in the next few weeks as more more units are put back online. Those units were out for several months due to a number of factors.<\/p>\n
Ramokgopa said they were confident the system was stabilising. <\/p>\n
\u201cOn the issue of performance, (we are) more that satisfied. We have shown where we moved from a historic low of 48% of energy availability factor, we have been averaging 60% energy availability factor. (When) we went to the winter period, the worst case scenario was stage 8. We only had 30 hours of stage 6. You can see the intensity of load shedding is coming down. The issues of outage slips, I have shown to you they have come down from a high of 3 300MW to 766MW,\u201d said Ramokgopa. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe remain confident about our ability to resolve the load shedding question,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
He said more units were coming back on stream at Tutuka and Kusile power stations and this will increase the energy availability factor.<\/p>\n
In the next few weeks this will improve significantly, he said.<\/p>\n
Ramokgopa\u2019s briefing comes as Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy Gwede Mantashe was this week expected to release the Integrated Resource Plan for 2023.<\/p>\n
The IRP is proposing different sources of energy to achieve energy security supply.<\/p>\n
The government has said it believes that coal was still part of energy mix. This applies to other sources of energy including hydro, gas, nuclear, solar, wind and battery storage.<\/p>\n
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za<\/p>\n
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