Regardless of an “exceptionally poor” efficiency in its 2024 monetary yr, state-owned power utility Eskom mentioned it expects to submit a revenue for the primary time in years within the yr ended 31 March 2025.
Chatting with the media on Thursday, board chairman Mteto Nyati mentioned the earlier yr, to end-March 2024, noticed 329 days of load shedding – because the begin of the brand new monetary yr, there haven’t any rolling energy cuts in any respect (exterior of load discount in areas the place electrical energy theft is excessive).
“The truth that we had 329 days of load shedding is just not one thing we’re happy with, as that is the very best [number of] days of load shedding that we have now ever had as an organization [in a single year],” mentioned Nyati.
“On the again of that, we had to spend so much on diesel – about R34-billion – and this was largely as a result of we had been doing a whole lot of upkeep. Within the first six months [of the 2025 financial year], we had 250 days of no load shedding. And by way of financial savings on diesel, we saved R12-billion.”
He mentioned Eskom expects to report within the area of R10-billion in revenue for the present monetary yr.
Eskom reported a internet loss earlier than tax of R25.5-billion in 2024, an enchancment from the R34.6-billion loss the earlier yr. CEO Dan Marokane highlighted the robust hyperlinks between the utility’s operational efficiency and its monetary outcomes, citing the decline in plant availability from 56% in 2023 to 54% in 2024, 329 days of load shedding and 19.9TWh in power losses as a consequence of electrical energy theft as a few of the components contributing to poor outcomes. Worryingly, municipal debt ballooned to R74.4-billion from R58.5-billion in 2023.
Tariffs elevated by 19% and, though gross sales volumes declined by 3% yr on yr to 183TWh, income elevated by 14% to R295.8-billion. The losses after tax doubled from R26.1-billion in 2023 to R55-billion in 2024.
Outlook
One among Eskom’s key areas of focus following the improve of pay as you go metres is the retrieval of revenues from non-paying clients. Marokane mentioned the important thing change course of revealed that 2.1 million clients weren’t paying for electrical energy, amounting to a income lack of round R30-billion/yr. Eskom expects gross sales to extend by between 2% and three% within the present monetary yr.
Marokane mentioned the outlook for load shedding for the remainder of summer time is optimistic, with Eskom’s give attention to upkeep serving to to maintain unplanned outages between 11.5GW and 12GW, under the 13GW goal. Eskom plans to convey again an extra 2.5GW of era capability presently out of service as a consequence of upkeep in preparation for the 2025 winter season.
Learn: ‘South Africa can’t afford this’: Eskom value hike plan below hearth
Yr-to-date efficiency within the present monetary yr suggests Eskom has turned the nook, however Nyati warned that there are various issues that also have to be solved. Focus areas embrace decreasing emissions, additional unbundling the enterprise, incorporating cleaner era applied sciences, modernising the grid and addressing the municipal debt downside.
“We’re beginning to see the advantages of what we have now finished within the 2024 monetary yr, and efficiency has improved rather a lot. However there’s a lot that must be finished” past merely ending load shedding, mentioned Nyati. – © 2024 NewsCentral Media
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