South Africa has reached the symbolic milestone of 100 consecutive days without load shedding — the longest uninterrupted period of stable electricity supply in years — prompting measured celebration from Eskom and the government even as experts caution that the grid remains vulnerable and the achievement should not be taken as permanent.
Eskom Group CEO Dan Marokane confirmed the milestone in a briefing to the media, describing it as the result of a sustained programme of improved maintenance across the utility's generation fleet. The Energy Availability Factor — a key measure of how much of the fleet is generating at any given time — has climbed significantly over the past twelve months, reflecting fewer forced outages and more effective planned maintenance scheduling.
The National Energy Crisis Committee (NECOM), chaired from the Presidency, has identified several factors contributing to the improved situation. These include the addition of significant private sector rooftop solar capacity — now estimated at over 6 gigawatts across residential and commercial installations — which has materially reduced peak demand on the Eskom grid during daylight hours.
Battery storage projects and wheeling agreements, which allow businesses and municipalities to procure power directly from independent renewable energy producers, have further diversified the supply mix. The government's accelerated licensing of new generation projects under the revised Electricity Regulation Act has attracted significant private investment over the past 18 months.
Eskom's leadership has cautioned against complacency, noting that several aging coal-fired units remain at risk of unplanned outages and that the addition of more than 6 000 megawatts of new generation capacity planned under the Integrated Resource Plan is urgently needed to create a sustainable buffer. Load shedding, they emphasised, has been paused — not resolved.
