As we are all aware, South Africa is in the midst of an energy crisis. In order to attend to this Eskom and the Government have proposed to implement the Power Conservation Programme.
The key elements of the program would be as follows:
Quota Allocations
The programme is designed to achieve the overall savings target of between 10 - 15% over time. This target allows for a moderate growth of approximately 3.6% in electricity consumption. The quota allocation allows for differentiation of customers by class. To illustrate this, for example, based on a possible target of an immediate 8% overall savings, the large energy consumers could be required to reduce their consumption based
on the following targets:
- Industrial = 10%
- Commercial (general) = 15%
- Hotels, resorts, shopping malls & conference centres = 20%
- Large office buildings, government, municipal & electricity utility offices = 15%
- Agriculture = 5%
- Residential = 10%
For special cases, there will no targets that will be imposed. The special cases include, but not limited to hospitals, essential and security installations.
Penalties & Cut-offs
Various penalty measures are being explored. The measures that are currently being explored include but not limited to:
- Incentives
- Penalty tariff rates for energy use above the allocated quota
- Cut – offs for a specific period for repeat offenders
- Special cases will be exempt from penalties
Incentives
An incentive scheme is being established for the smaller consumers that exceed their savings targets
Trading
Large consumers can trade in their unused portion of quota allocation.
There will also be possible provision for larger consumers to “take or pay” their allocated portion.
Built-in Flexibility
The plan will be designed to ensure that there are possibilities to be able to adjust the quotas and penalties to address the possible changing needs in future.
Benefits of the Power Conservation Programme
It is expected that the Power Conservation Programme will yield among others, the following benefits:
- The reserve margin will improve
- The need for load shedding will be greatly reduced or eliminated for that matter
- The programme will provide space to perform maintenance of the generation assets
- There will also be a dramatic improvement of energy efficiency viability
- This will have a positive impact on climate change due to reduced energy consumption
- There will be productivity gains in economy through elimination of wasteful energy usage
- There will be behavioural change (energy conservation) forced which could become permanent