Dear Readers, it’s my sincere hope that by the time you read this missive – created at the end of 2022 – that the commentary put forward here will be inconsequential, as someone with brains will have dealt with the latest Eskom crisis.
The paraphrased headline refers to a famous quote oft said by Oliver Hardy to his comedian companion, Stan Laurel – Lauren & Hardy – during their hilarious encounters back in the 1930’s and 40’s.
Why it is so relevant today is that the situation at Eskom goes from bad to worse, and those that predict a complete electrical blackout are starting to become believable.
Despite the gloom of 14 years of predicted and actual loadshedding, there have been some highlights in Eskom’s generation portfolio. One is Koeberg nuclear power station which has been operating, safely and virtually trouble free since 1985, supplying 1 900MW 24/7. As readers will know, Koeberg is undergoing refurbishment work which will increase life expectancy and its capacity.
Another highlight has been the construction of the Eskom open cycle gas turbine (OCGT) power stations – Ankerlig in Atlantis and Gourikwa in Mossel Bay – which came into operation, in record time, between 2007 – 2009. These OCGT stations were originally designed as peak lopping and emergency generators which combined could provide around 2 000MW to the grid. Both stations are dual fuel units – they can run on diesel or natural gas. Government dithering has delayed the adoption of a cheaper natural gas option and the stations used to consume vast amounts of diesel fuel as instead of peak lopping they have had to run continuously in emergency mode 24/7 due to the collapse of the coal fired fleet of aging and lately poorly designed power stations.
That was until at the end of November, when it was announced that Eskom had effectively run out of diesel and there was no money to top up the tanks until new budgets came on line on April Fool’s Day 2023, effectively depriving the economy – you and me – of the desperately needed 2 000MW and adding two stages of loadshedding to our current ‘load’. Perhaps a more potentially catastrophic consequence is that with Ankerlig off line, there is apparently no emergency back-up power for Koeberg, should anything go wrong with the station’s reactors…
The exceptional reliability of the OCGT generators has been proven over the best part of 12 years continuous operation, but powering the units with diesel is not sustainable, nor was it ever conceived as being so – natural gas was intended to be the primary fuel supply.
Why no gas?
Recent gas discoveries in Mpumalanga and the Free State, plus the ROMPCO pipeline from Mozambique, will be able to provide all our gas to power needs, and a healthy export business of LNG, making the country self-sufficient in this source of energy, but there are technical issues which favour OCGT, or better still more efficient Combined Cycle Gas Turbines (CCGT) to be constructed at sea level rather than on the Highveld. It’s cheaper to transport electrons rather than LNG!
The construction of LNG terminals to allow imported gas – either from our own offshore gas fields or from the Middle East – has been painfully slow with the first at Richards Bay (to feed the proposed 3 000MW CCGT station) only scheduled to come online in 2024 – why so long from inception to production of 5 years? (Rhetorical question). And why not also Saldanha Bay which could feed the ubiquitous Ankerlig station plus the Western Cape hinterland from Shell’s discoveries off shore of the West Coast?
By contrast, when Germany found itself in the predicament of no gas due to the Ukrainian conflict, they pulled out the stops and constructed the first floating LNG terminal at the port of Wilhelmshaven, on Germany’s North Sea coast in the record time of just 200days! They plan a further five strategically placed LNG terminals which will cost the government more than six billion euros or R102bn in our money.
An eminently fixable mess.
Eish.
