SA returns to brink of record electricity outages

South Africa’s state-owned power utility will remove 6 000 megawatts from the national grid until further notice due to breakdowns at power stations, raising the risk of a new record for daily electricity rationing.

Eskom will implement the so-called stage-6 load shedding from 4 p.m. on Wednesday “due to severe capacity constraints” at eight coal-powered plants, it said in a statement. That equates to consumers being deprived of power for six or more hours a day.

The struggling utility rationed power on 205 days of last year. While Eskom has never cut more than 6 000 megawatts at a time from the grid, it has used up diesel supplies allocated for the year through March and a unit at its nuclear plant is shut down for a revamp. That means any additional faults among its assets and infrastructure could move the country to a a higher level of outages.