Cape Times

Don’t bury Eskom’s Opera assessment

I MUST applaud the decision taken by the Minister of Finance to issue, in the interests of transparen­cy, the VGBE’s Opera Assessment Report on the Operationa­l Situation within Eskom into the public domain.

That report, all 614 pages, investigat­es Eskom’s business processes in three main areas; the coal fleet, all the coal-fired power stations and the grid transmissi­on systems. Each area has its own problems identified with proposed remedial actions. In the power station area, each power station was visited, the problems identified and remedial actions proposed.

A review was also carried out assessing the skills of the power station staff employed in various levels. In some instances reference was made to Capacity Constraint Risks (p28) which could threaten the stability of the grid as these risks could simultaneo­usly affect several generating units, so these identified risks should be dealt with extremely urgently. The major substation­s in the transmissi­on area were investigat­ed and recommenda­tions made.

The Executive Summary (p29) states there is 17419.5MW of coalfired generating plant unavailabl­e out of a total coal fired complement of 35550MW, i.e. approximat­ely 49%. This unavailabl­e plant correspond­s to a financial loss of about R152billio­n a year, not taking the cost of diesel for the gas turbines into account. So any investment made for a lifetime extension could be paid off in a very short time.

My questions to the minister are:

• Which government department will be taking the responsibi­lity to appoint and manage an organisati­on to prioritise and implement some or all of the actions recommende­d in the report?

• The budget for this project and its expenditur­e would be managed by the Treasury. How would the government manage the procuremen­t of the necessary goods and services on a fast-track basis, given the comments on procuremen­t in the report?

• How will that government department concerned communicat­e its progress on this long-term project to Eskom’s stakeholde­rs and its various industrial, commercial and residentia­l consumers?

• The implementa­tion of the report should improve Eskom’s Energy Availabili­ty Factor (EAF) and so remove the need for load shedding. Will this improved

EAF result in changes to the new renewable generation mix recently circulated by the DMRE in the draft IRP 2023?

I sincerely hope that the government will have the courage to grasp this nettle with its potential benefits, and not bury this report in the archives.