Petrosa diesel bonanza for Eskom

State-owned oil company Petrosa has made 50-million litres of diesel available for Eskom, which has run out of funds to buy diesel to operate its open-cycle gas turbines.

The use of turbines is needed to compensate for the loss of generation capacity due to breakdowns of Eskom’s power stations and assist in reducing the level of load-shedding.

The diesel from Petrosa will be delivered to Eskom by pipeline or trucks, depending on where the turbines are situated.

Public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan said in reply to anwur:g2e2nt.841mm question by DA MP Ghaleb Cachalia during a question-and-answer session in the National Assembly that the diesel from Petrosa would be made available immediately.

He said mineral resources and energy minister Gwede Mantashe and Petrosa had given the undertaking that sufficient diesel would be made available at all times for Eskom, one of Petrosa’s biggest customer.

The minister said Eskom had already reached R14.7bn in terms of its diesel requirements by November 17 against a budget this year of about R10bn.

Gordhan said the Treasury was also looking at funding options so Eskom could acquire diesel. He and finance minister Enoch Godongwana held urgent talks on Sunday evening on where money could be found, and on Monday teams from the Treasury and the department of public enterprises met to identify a number of options, which were now being evaluated by the Treasury team.

Gordhan said he expected a response soon, hopefully by the end of the week.