Nuclear power station Koeberg was operating at 90% capacity on Sunday and would be fully operational by Monday, Eskom said.
”It is generating about 90% of its output … The staff at Koeberg will continue monitoring the situation and increase capacity to 100% by tomorrow [Monday],” said company spokesperson Fanie Zulu.
Supply interruptions stopped on Friday evening and electricity demand was met without incident on Saturday and Sunday.
Power cuts ended before the power station was returned to full service because electricity was generated from other sources, such as gas turbines.
Industrial users also agreed to cut down on their power use, allowing electricity to be diverted for domestic use, Zulu said.
”Consumers in the Western Cape responded positively to the call to save electricity. We want to encourage them to use available resources in a sparing way,” he added.
Last week, Eskom also lauded the launch of power alerts on all South African Broadcasting Corporation television channels. ”It is proving to be an effective communication channel, eliciting positive response from consumers,” Eskom said.
The province has been plagued by power failures recently caused by repair and maintenance work to both of Koeberg’s generating units.
Andrew Etzinger, general manager responsible for Eskom’s demand-side management programme in the Western Cape, said last week: ”Load-shedding in the Western Cape had not been necessary since May 22 2006 because the 100MW to 150MW shortfall over peak-demand periods can be made up through additional generation from the City of Cape Town’s Steenbras pumped-storage scheme, DMP [demand market participation] customers and the leased-in gas-fired generators. The combination of demand- and supply-side measures is working well together.”
DMP is a measure that allows Eskom customers to participate in the Eskom Power Pool by putting their load reductions ”up for sale”.
He warned, however, that a drop in temperatures was almost guaranteed to lead to an increase in demand, and urged consumers to maintain the momentum of energy efficient behaviour that was starting to emerge. ”We are by no means out of the woods and we appeal to customers to consider how they can make small changes at work and at home to assist in alleviating demand.” — Sapa, I-Net Bridge