Go easy on your electricity usage, urges City Power

CITY Power is urging customers to use electricity sparingly over the winter months, warning of the likelihood of load rotation and load shedding in hot spot areas.

With the winter season looming, the utility is already experiencing capacity constraints in most areas, especially where illegal connections are on the rise, said City Power chief executive Lerato Setshedi.

“We are projecting the demand for electricity to increase and the power system is forecast to be tight in the coming weeks.

“City Power has activated its winter plan in anticipation of the challenges that are brought by increased number of unplanned power outages due to overloaded grid,” he said.

The plan includes increasing its substation transformer capacity to a maximum level, to make resources, spares and materials readily available for quick and adequate response to power outages, and to embark on an educational campaign to advise customers to use power sparingly.

While 90% of the City Power areas are electrified, said Setshedi, informal settlements were still mushrooming and often illegally connect to electricity infrastructure, which overload the grid. This is usually accompanied by vandalism of the electricity network.

City Power has identified certain hot spot areas where there are increases in electricity demand, partly due to illegal connections, which cause repeated unplanned power outages.

“The winter plan is not only dependent upon measures put in place by City Power, but also requires co-operation from all of our customers,” Setshedi added.

Some of the simple and cost-effective ways include considering the use of alternatives and less intensive heating methods such as gas, compact fluorescent lighting, solar-water heaters or heat generation conventional fireplaces.

Customers should be considerate and switch off all non-essential items between 4pm and 10pm. Switch off geysers, heaters, hot plates not in use, swimming pool pumps and electric blankets.

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If not at work during the lockdown, consider cooking early to enable those at work a chance to do so when they return after 5pm.

As a last resort, City Power will, where necessary, implement load rotation in areas that are experiencing repeated power outages as a result of overloading caused by, among others, illegal connections.

The load rotation will be implemented daily between 4pm and 10pm in areas where monitoring suggested infrastructure was under severe strain.

Illegal connections do not happen in the informal settlements only, there has apparently been an increase in the suburbs as well.

On a regular basis, City Power conducts audits on its customers, businesses, body corporates and large power users to identify those that are bypassing meters and not paying for their services.

When customers are found cheating the system, City Power does not hesitate to disconnect electricity supply, and take legal steps against the customers. There is a fine/fee to be paid before a reconnection can be effected.

The public are urged to report any illegal behaviour anonymously on 0800 002 587.