Medupi will start up in 2019

All six units of Eskom’s Medupi Power Station will be completed in the first half of 2019, adding another 4 764 megawatts (MW) into the national electricity grid, the South African Cabinet said on Friday. Started in May 2007, Medupi was supposed to be online in 2015, but strikes and financial hiccups caused a five-year delay. It resulted in Eskom’s load shedding programme being implemented to avoid a total blackout, because it did not have enough power capacity to cater for the demand. The first unit of Medupi started commercially adding 800 MW last weekend, but had started contributing power during its synchronisation period from March 2. “During this period Unit Six has been able to alleviate pressure on the national electricity system, helping to either avoid load shedding altogether or minimise its severity,” Cabinet said. “The commercial operation of Unit Six of the Medupi Power Station is a critical milestone in our effort to build new generating capacity,” it said, adding that President Jacob Zuma will launch this unit on August 30. Eskom said that it has managed to avoid implementing load shedding for 19 days in a row. "Eskom has met the country’s electricity demand while operating its generation fleet in a sustainable manner for almost three weeks, resulting in no load shedding for 19 consecutive days," it said in a statement. Labour problems resulted in significant strikes and labour unrest during the construction period, which brought work at Medupi and Kusile? Power Station to a standstill. "Initially Eskom did not implement a site-wide labour agreement," said energy expert Chris Yelland in a 2014 Fin24 report. CAPE TOWN FIN24