LOAD REDUCTION FOR THE WEEK

Eskom will implement load reduction on Tuesday, 22 December 2020 and Friday, Christmas Day, 25 December 2020. Both the scheduled power outages will be implemented from 17:00 to 22:00.

Residents in parts of Kaalfontein, Ebony Park, Ivory Park, Rabie Ridge, Tswelopele and Lindokuhle will have a ‘black Christmas’ as the power utility continues to implement load reduction in high density areas with high instances of meter bypassing and illegal connections. The load reduction is implemented to avoid network overloading and transformer failures.

It appears that the Load Reduction implementation is not working as it should be. A transformer failed in Ebony Park Ext 4 late last week leaving more than 50 households without power.

It is unclear when the transformer in Ebony Park will be replaced as the power utility usually takes a minimum of 3 months to replace a failed transformer. This is done once an audit is conducted and households found to be meter bypassing, illegally connecting to the grid and purchasing electricity from ghost vendors (buy 1 get 1 free) are issued with fines of around R6,000.

Communities are encouraged to report meter bypasses, illegal connections and vandalism of the electricity infrastructure on the Eskom Crime-Line number: 0800 11 27 22.