News24 | Joburg load shedding to be limited to two-hour slots as City Power takes over

• City Power will limit load shedding slots to two hours at a time as it takes over the management of power outages from Eskom next week.
• Currently, Eskom slots are up to four hours.
• A City Power spokesperson says this is an effort to help keep businesses afloat and save jobs.
• For more financial news, go to the News24 Business front page.

From next week, City Power will manage load shedding in Johannesburg after reaching an agreement with Eskom. 

The city's power utility has vowed to limit load shedding slots to a maximum of up to two hours - even during Stages 5 and above.

City Power spokesperson Isaac Mangena says load shedding slots of four hours are not sustainable and have forced local businesses to close.

On Monday afternoon, Eskom announced that it will hand over load shedding operations to City Power effective from Monday, 6 November.

This will bring changes to load shedding blocks and affect schedules in Johannesburg and other Gauteng areas.

Details of the revised blocks and new schedules can be found here.

"We are trying to prevent job losses [by assuming load shedding management]," Mangena told News24. City Power also has plans to completely exclude a number of bigger companies, especially industrial firms, completely from load shedding by reconfiguring the network.

However, due to the configuration of the network and technical complexities, Eskom will continue to manage the load shedding of City Power customers in Tshepisong, Lufhereng (Roodepoort), Hoogland, Maroeladal, Morningside, Riverclub, Dainfern, Bloubosrand, Waterford Estate, Riverbend, Kyasands, Bellairspark (Randburg), Halfway House, Halfway Gardens, Vorna Valley, Willowway (Midrand) and Marlboro Transit Camp (Alexandra).

"The two entities will keep exploring technical solutions that will enable City Power to take over the load shedding operations of its remaining customers," Eskom said in a statement.

City Power controls almost 260 substations in the Johannesburg area.

Earlier this year, Eskom seized control of load shedding from the City of Ekurhuleni after the municipality failed to implement power cuts to protect large local industries.

It returned the load shedding function to the City in July.