Since September 2020, the City of Cape Town has protected its customers through the use of the Steenbras Hydro Pumped Storage Scheme (SHPSS) and to a lesser extent, its gas turbines for a total of 457 hours or an equivalent of about 19 full days. Currently, it is protecting its customers from two stages of load-shedding for most of the day. City customers are currently likely the only ones in South Africa who will not be on Stage 4 load-shedding at all today until 22:00 tonight. The City is able to protect customers based on generation capacity and usage and it is not a given.

‘This amount of load-shedding is simply unsustainable to our residents and businesses and the South African economy as a whole. The lack of leadership from National Government on the urgent changes required in the energy regime is a blow to all South Africans. As a well-run city, investment and maintenance in infrastructure is critical to ensure that assets such as the Steenbras scheme and gas turbines can be used to assist where possible. The City also uses the Steenbras scheme as a way to reduce the tariff impact on customers by typically generating when the Eskom tariff is at its highest, to reduce exposure to the highest Eskom tariff for City customers,’ said the City’s Executive Mayor, Alderman Dan Plato.

‘City supplied customers in Cape Town are thus the only ones in South Africa who are likely avoiding Stage 4 load-shedding for most of today. Thanks to our hard working City teams for helping to make this possible under trying conditions and uncertainty, at short notice.

‘The City is moving ahead with its energy plans in earnest. This includes establishing the Atlantis Power Station 2023; plans for a renewable energy hub at the Athlone Power Station; planning to procure at least 300 MW of energy from independent producers, including ongoing consultation with National Government to speed this up; and pursuing a range of renewable energy projects from 1 MW to 100 MW, to be owned and operated on municipal land, with a call for proposals issued on low-cost finance solutions over a period of 20 years,’ said Mayor Plato.

‘Sadly, the City has still received no real legal clarity from the National Department of Mineral Resources and Energy as to what is allowed and what is not in terms of independent power producers (IPPs). The City continues to call on National Government to expedite the processes related to IPPs. The City remains committed to doing everything in its power to reduce the heavy dependency on Eskom,’ said Mayor Plato.

Source: City Of Cape Town