Today I was driving past one of the Eskom peaking hydro power stations in the Drakensberg (Kilburn dam) and went to have a look.
There were Eskom staff all over the place but there were also a parking lot full of contractor vehicles. I asked what was happening and was told one of the generators had failed.
What comforted me about learning this is that Eskom is clearly using these peaking stations and that contractors are there as well to keep the system up and running.
1 Like
Just found this ⌠Eskomâs view:
Connect Prosumer SSEG[82].pdf (577.9 KB)
In that Doc, I see they are slowly getting serious âŚ
All and all, similar to what CoCT did years ago, for connecting SSEF to their grid.
///////////////////a couple of things stand out here. The first is âreceive a quotation from eskomâ and the other is âpay the application feeâ.
Registering with the CoCT is free. Looks like Eskom is planning on making some money off of this.
1 Like
Eskom: the generation, transmission and distribution of paperwork.
ESKOM, has outsourced to 3rd party outsourced meter readers.
They canât afford their people to visit your installation.
Last time, I enquired about how to register with ESKOM there was no reply, on further enquiry apparently you theyâd stopped it because they had enough problems to deal with at the time.
It just flying a kite, donât worry about it.
Eskom: We need Oracle people please⌠to do everything⌠(this is going to be a HUGE issue for them).
Wait for their first major Database Crash or corruptionâŚ
Iâm a direct eskom customer, I also asked about solar installs and how to register, got nothing but chirping crickets.
Eskom canât be seen to condone your connection.
But in reality, theyâve got 10âs of thousands of non-paying illegal connections in the townships to deal with without upsetting paying customers, who are doing what they want and using less of their product.
Itâll be a long time before they get around to you unless you are sleeping with the neighbourâs wife and he works for Eskom.
2 Likes
Unless you have a parate local Eskom branch ⌠like maybe in and around CoCT and some surrounds.
They must be new staff.
Once youâve worked for Eskom for seven years, youâll never work again.
1 Like
I smell a rat here: Why the alarm bells about unauthorised SSEG connections?
This explains why no one is raising their hand when asked if they are feeding into the gridâŚ
Unless you going to benefit by feeding back and have the correct meter installed ect than its pretty pointless to feed back to the grid just for the sake of it. Most meters if not set up specifically for back feed will actually charge you for feeding back at the same rate as if it were supplying or if it doesnât do that they can trip. So I think most with solar donât feed back.
There are still plenty of electromechanical meters which will rotate in the reverse direction when power flows back to the grid. I have two of these in my house (but I am not feeding back into the grid 
)
My question as wellâŚ
Because Iâm one of the last honest electricity consumers⌠
1 Like
So are we all here ⌠
1 Like
If I was oh say, a person who happened to have been tasked for a few years to look into my countryâs power utility issues. Then say, I became president and installed my brother-in-law as minister of energy affairs, who in turn forced the hand of the utility to buy solar power at inflated prices from our other mutual billionaire previously disadvantaged brother-in-law.
That would be legal, but is it honest?
If this were medieval times sir, you would be like a serf taking advantage of an opportunity to grow enough food to feed your family, without paying the kingâs tax. That would not be legal, but is it immoral?
Here you are bending over backwards to be legal, it is easy to be legal if you write the laws. That you canât is a function of your station in society, all the best people are doing it.
Apartheid, the american revolution and every anti-oppressive revolution you care to mention werenât halted by people being meek and compliant. If someone can still win a hand, in a deck that is this stacked against them, I wonât judge them.
Hush, these things of which you speak are for dark corners in whispered tones, lest the boogeyman hears you. They are things of our forefathers, extinct like dragons and faeries, best consigned to myth and legend. The less said the better.
2 Likes
It was one of those mind-blown times for me, they day when I realised that the term âmurderâ is in fact a legal thing. What makes it murder is that there is a law against it. If there is no law⌠then it is mere âkillingâ. The particular case in point was âState vs Mshumpaâ, where a baby was literally murdered in utero⌠but could not be prosecuted as such. Yeah⌠bit of an OT detour⌠but the world is a scary place sometimes.
Has anyone been cautioned about exceeding the 12 month net consumer of electricity rule by CoCT? Iâm wondering how this is managed as your account statement does not provide the current 12 month import / export totals Now the excuse of it potentially requiring a NERSA generating licence falls by the wayside with the recent 100MW limit for not requiring a permit to generate surely
This wasnât the only issue as I recall: CoCT is still not authorised to purchase net electricity from you. Theyâre bypassing the purchase rule by saying âLook, over 12m, weâre not actually buying anything, mmmmkay?â
Under that Nersa rule, youâre allowed to generate it, but CoCT still canât buy it.