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Erwin wants 10% power saving
31/01/2008 08:23 - (SA)
Cape Town - Power cuts could be a thing of the past if metropolitan areas cut their electricity usage by 10%, Public Enterprises Minister Alec Erwin said on Wednesday.
He appealed to metros to "try and find ways of closing down 10% of your requirements".
"If we can do that we can avoid even planned load shedding," he told MPs during Parliament's special joint sitting to discuss the electricity crisis.
More resources had to be thrown into maintenance. This could not be done with a low reserve margin, he said.
The most urgent priority was reducing demand and stabilising the national electricity system.
A meeting with large users of electricity on Tuesday saw a proposal that they reduce their demand by 4 000MW over the next four weeks.
"This gives us the space to catch up on maintenance and refine the targets and supply conditions for our various customer segments."
'Fantastic' support
The following four months would then see demand being reduced by a further 3 000MW by rationing large users such as mines and smelters.
"Their support was fantastic," said Erwin of Tuesday's meeting.
Responding to comments and calls for heads to roll made by MPs following a speech by Minerals and Energy Minister Buyelwa Sonjica, Erwin said: "We forget that we were all sitting in a massive energy summit in September 2007 and none of you had these brilliant plans."
"No amount of baying for sacrificial lambs" would obviate the need for South Africans to "pull together" and solve the situation.
He said government and energy utility Eskom would also embark on an aggressive energy saving campaign.
"Energy-saving behaviour needs to be inculcated," he said.
Defending Eskom's decision not to give mining houses a supply-of-power guarantee, Erwin said Eskom had a duty to exercise caution under the current circumstances.
The government had to "err on the side of caution" by implementing power cuts, as it could not risk the entire system going down.
The problem was the manner in which the decision was communicated, not the decision itself, he said.
New forms of energy
On what Eskom intended doing to increase supply, Erwin said there would a move towards "greater use of IPPs (Independent Power Producers)".
The second component would be looking for forms of energy that could be brought into the system quickly, such as that generated by sugar mills and refineries.
Gas turbines were the third measure.
However, only "certain amounts" of turbine-generated power could be introduced very quickly.
- SAPA
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