Eskom on Tuesday disputed the findings of the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) that the energy supplier’s negligence and breaches of licence conditions were causes of power outages in the Western Cape.
Eskom CEO Thulani Gcabashe said it accepted certain shortcomings on its part but that these did not amount to a breach of licence conditions or negligence.
”Given the extraordinary circumstances in the Western Cape at the time, we are confident that Eskom’s performance was in line with the operational plans and parameters agreed with the regulator,” Gcabashe said.
He said Eskom would resist any attempts by Nersa to impose ”unjustified penalties and sanctions”.
Nersa said on Tuesday it had not yet decided on what punitive action, if any, to take against Eskom over power outages.
Negligence, bad maintenance and breaches of licence conditions by Eskom were some of the causes of power cuts in the Western Cape between November 2005 and February this year, the regulator found.
Also on Tuesday, it released a report of an investigation by its predecessor, the National Electricity Regulator, into several incidents that caused the outages.
The shutting down of one of the generators at Koeberg in December — after it was damaged by a loose bolt — did, however, not form part of the investigation.
”There was already another agency of the state investigating that matter,” Collin Matjila, chairperson of Nersa said.
Minister of Public Enterprises Alec Erwin at one stage blamed the loose bolt on sabotage, but later withdrew the statement. Matjila said the final report contained no mention of the incident.
Erwin was due to make public the outcome of the ”bolt incident” in Parliament on Thursday. Eskom said it will have a full press conference on the Nersa findings and that of the department after the minister’s speech.
In the meantime, Matjila said Nersa was considering several ”sanctions and corrective actions” against Eskom, but had not yet decided what course to follow.
If it uses the old Electricity Act it may lay criminal charges for which the maximum penalty is R500.
It could, however, also use the new Electricity Regulation Act, which came into force this month, but was not sure if it could be applied retrospectively.
Under the new Act a tribunal may impose a fine of 10% of Eskom’s annual turnover or R2-million a day. ”Our lawyers are looking into the matter,” Matjila said.
The regulator could also make ”clawbacks” of up to R300-million on the electricity supplier’s Multi-Year Price Determination. In practice this means Eskom would have to be satisfied with a lower increase in fees than asked for.
”All the measures are open to us but the emphasis would be to look at the future and ensure these types of incidents do not occur again,” Matjila said.
Nersa said it was satisfied that Eskom’s Western Cape recovery plan was adequate for the short to medium term. ”We don’t expect only limited challenges to the electricity supply in the Western Cape next year,” said Thembani Bukula, full time electricity regulator at Nersa.
Eskom said it was ”delighted” that the power supply in the Western Cape was back to normal and was taking further actions to ensure ”greater reliability” in future. — Sapa