'Govt was warned about power'

2008-01-31 09:46

Cobus Coetzee, Cobus Claassen, Liezel de Lange and Amanda Tongha

Johannesburg - Eskom advised municipalities in the 1980s and early 1990s to close down their own power stations.

But, now the electricity giant is saying its big consumers and local authorities should develop their own capacity to generate electricity.

Municipal government expert advocate Werner Zybrands said on Wednesday: "Authorities can be sorry that they did not maintain those power stations. Some have been demolished or are just ruins."

Several municipalities used to be able to generate their own electricity and were not entirely dependent on Eskom.

Zybrands said: "Local authorities of Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Bloemfontein and Cape Town used to have their own power stations.

"However, that capacity disappeared because Eskom wanted to have the monopoly to some extent."

Only about 10 years after municipal power stations were closed down did Eskom again invest in infrastructure.

Since the late 1990s, President Thabo Mbeki and his Cabinet have on several occasions been warned about a future power crisis.

In 1998, the White Paper on Energy Policy warned that Eskom's power reserves would run out by 2007 if the government did not make the necessary investments. But, the government decided in 2001 not to invest in infrastructure.

Chief government spokesperson Themba Maseko said on Wednesday the reason for this was that the government believed independent power producers would come to the fore.

Maseko said: "By 2003, the government realised that would not work and announced investments in infrastructure.

"That is when Eskom started reopening closed-down power stations and planning new ones."

Zybrands said it would be difficult for municipalities to revive their old power stations.

"They are too old and the authorities have got rid of all their experts in the meantime," he said.

In Pretoria, the Tshwane metro council's Rooiwal and Tshwane West power stations are used mainly in the winter months, when it is cost-effective to do so.

In Johannesburg, only 20% of its power is supplied by the metro council's Kelvin power station.

Zybrands said local authorities wouldn't be in a hurry to invest in infrastructure.

"Most of the municipal power distribution services will fall away soon, when the six new regional electricity distributors take over these functions from local authorities.

"So, they will not easily spend their money on power generation," he said.