Suburban
Government has assured the nation that it is making all efforts to ensure adequate power supplies with one thermal power station and 10 renewable power stations expected to be commissioned this year to add a total of 150 Megawatts to the national electricity grid.
Suburban Reporter
The assurance comes in the wake of the load shedding which power utility ZESA Holdings has been implementing following a drop in power generation as a result of interruptions in electricity supplies due to technical faults. This week Power and Energy Development Minister Soda Zhemu presented a weekly report to Cabinet on the state of the country’s power supply situation.
He told the meeting of the efforts being made to mitigate the current depressed power generation, which is severely affecting domestic and business consumers of electricity as the country is at the peak of its winter season when demand for power rises.
“Government would like to assure the citizenry that it is expending all efforts to ensure adequate power supplies throughout the country, with some power deficit mitigation projects set to come on stream before year end.
“Cabinet advises that one thermal power project and ten renewable energy projects will come on board this year. The thermal power project will add 50 megawatts to the national grid, while the renewable energy projects will provide about 100 megawatts, translating to a combined total of about 150 megawatts being realized from the projects,” Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Minister Monica Mutsvangwa told a post Cabinet media briefing in Harare.
Last week, ZESA subsidiary the Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC) appealed to its customers to save energy during the winter season saying the saved energy will be utilised by the next customer thereby relieving pressure on the national electricity grid and in turn reducing incidences of load shedding.
The power company gave a number of tips which electricity consumers could make use of to save energy, in a separate statement also issued by its stakeholder relations department.
“ZETDC advises consumers to take the following steps to ensure that the electricity grid is not put under pressure:
Switch off lights in all rooms that are not being used
Switch off all non-essential appliances such as geysers, borehole pumps, microwaves, electric kettles, televisions, refrigerators, deep freezers, heaters and other every use electrical equipment during morning peak periods of 0600 hours to 1000 hours as well as during evening peak periods of 1800 hours to 2100 hours
Switch off stove plate five minutes before your cooking time. The stove plate retains enough heat to fully cook the food
Regulate your geysers to as near body temperature as possible
Match stove plates with the correct size of pots and pans to ensure maximum heat transfer from stove plate
Do not use stove to warm the house
Switch from incandescent light bulbs to energy saving (LED) bulbs
In the interest of safety, do not attempt to repair electrical faults on your own. Instead contact your nearest ZETDC Customer Service Centres (depots) for assistance.
The appeal by ZETDC comes at a time when the power utility has just started load shedding electricity with a number of consumers complaining that the power company had not warned them or provided a schedule of when their areas will be under load shedding so they could plan accordingly.
Consumers are also complaining that sometimes the load shedding goes for longer periods and the fact that some areas never experience load shedding while others are constantly switched off.
Of late, the ZETDC has also been switching off a number of residential areas in Harare to carry out maintenance work and repairs.
In addition to the load shedding, frequent faults in some northern suburbs particularly in Greendale, Mandara, parts of Borrowdale and in some Harare West suburbs such as Westgate has seen consumers going for a number of days without electricity.
