I'm not so sure that this is the main culprit. In the report they mentioned that there were 3700MW of planned outages, and 5000MW of unplanned outages (total of about 22% loss of supply) in the week of January 14. These are the reasons they gave,
- Boiler Tube leaks/failure
- Various smaller equipment failure
- Generator output reductions (load losses) as a result of coal quality
- Problems with coal supply
Yes, coal supply has played a role in this, but it all comes back to demand. The systems (maintenance, coal delivery, etc.) are not in place to deal with such a small reserve margin.
One little thing not working as planned (from a broken circuit breaker to a late coal delivery) sends ripples through the whole system, placing more strain on the resources that are working correctly.
Yes, Eskom needs to sort out their coal supply. Yes, they need to look at increasing the margin. And yes, they need to draw in the right skills to manage all of this.
But, the reality is that if we don't all change out habits, this crisis will turn into a disaster.
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