No power bill relief, instead we pay more
A MONTH of load shedding and hours spent in the dark should see reductions in electricity use and bills, but it doesn’t work like that. Instead, South Africans are paying more.
So far load shedding has blighted South Africa for 86 of the 281 days of 2022, about a third of the year. No electricity should mean relief in back pockets, and to understand why this is not so, we turned to the experts.
“You have to remember that electricity for people who live in municipalities went up in July, so you are not going to see a decrease in how much you pay.
“In fact, there is a 9.6% (8.6% for eThekwini residents) relative increase in terms of what you paid in June to what you are paying now,” said energy expert Lungile Mashele.
He added that people assumed that because there was load shedding, they were saving on electricity. The problem is that activities which need power are deferred: South Africans are bathing and cooking at different times to avoid load shedding and this often falls into the expensive peak periods of electricity use.
“The other biggest reason why people do not see a reduction is that they forget that during load shedding, especially during long periods or long bouts of load shedding, your electrical appliances such as your freezer, which may have been on -20°C for instance, goes up to -10°C,” said Mashele.
“Then when you are back up again, it has to go back down to -20°C and you experience a surge. The surge comes back during peak tariff time, so not only do you have a surge, but you are now almost paying double for electricity in some cases.”
Professor Hartmut Winkler, of the Department of Physics at the University of Johannesburg, said while reduced power consumption should see electricity bills going down slightly, it would not be as much as people would hope for.
“There are various reasons why the reduction in electricity use is not in proportion to the reduction in load shedding-free hours,” said Winkler.
The biggest culprit in most houses is the hot-water geyser, he explained.
During load shedding the geyser cools.
“The moment load shedding comes back, the geyser immediately draws power, and it will stay on for longer than usual until it finally reaches the desired heat,” said Winkler.
“This means the daily average use of power to heat geysers stays roughly constant, even when it is a day with high load shedding. Note that geysers are one of the largest consumers of power in a typical household.”
EARLIER this week, South Africa passed a rather unfortunate milestone – an entire month of load shedding.
It’s an unprecedented – and unwelcome – achievement for a country that has been saddled with intermittent power cuts since 2007. The bad news is that the record is unlikely to stand.
Soon, we will have our first two uninterrupted months of load shedding. Just after that, we will have our first six months of load shedding, then, next up, probably a year.
It is not inconceivable, because there is neither a real plan nor the political will to enforce it if it existed.
South Africans are making a plan – as they always do – but strangely, power bills aren’t coming down. Far too many residents who still receive monthly accounts merely receive estimates – even though they are literally using a third to half of the power they did last year because it keeps getting cut off.
Given the spiralling cost of living, the raging unemployment and our tanking economy, it’s not just criminal, but downright immoral.
The reason is simple; municipalities derive an inordinate amount of their revenue from selling electricity, according to data journalists, Media Hack: 26% in Johannesburg, 36% in Ekurhuleni, 33% in Tshwane, Mangaung and eThekwini; and, 31% in Cape Town. In Joburg, electricity sales bring in just under R16 billion a year.
Not everyone can afford to seek alternative power solutions. The truth is, they shouldn’t have to. The problem should be fixed. The fact that our elected politicians – of whatever political hue – can’t, is bad enough.
The fact that they are not actively reducing monthly power bills to reflect the reduced service is unconscionable.
They need to be punished – at the polls. It’s time to get in people who can actually do what they are paid a lot of money to do.