News / National
ZESA struggling to bring back Hwange power unit before the winter season
07 May 2015 at 16:13hrs | Views
The power utility, ZESA, is struggling to bring back Hwange Unit 5 to life in time for the winter season.
Despite earlier promises that load-shedding will not increase in winter, power outages have intensified in the last two weeks.
Most parts on the country have witnessed intense load-shedding over the last two weeks with some areas going for over eight hours in the dark.
ZESA says the power outages are due to maintenance works at Hwange.
This is despite ZESA's undertaking that the power utility will cope with the winter demand.
Hwange Thermal Power Station has given the power utility engineers a headache as it is currently generating 309 megawatts out of an installed capacity of 920 megawatts.
ZESA Holdings Group Chief Executive Officer Engineer Josh Chifamba says major maintenance works are being carried at the old power station with Unit 5 expected to be back to full throttle before month-end.
"We will have an improved supply of power during this winter period. At the moment we are having major maintenance works at Hwange and we believe before the month-end everything will be in place. We will be able to generate more power than we are doing now," said Engineer Chifamba.
Besides Hwange's 309 megawatts, Kariba is generating 739 mega watts as at this Thursday.
Harare coal-fired power station is contributing 30 megawatts to the national grid while Munyati Power Station is generating 16 megawatts.
Bulawayo power station is generating 24 megawatts.
The country is not importing any power.
Despite earlier promises that load-shedding will not increase in winter, power outages have intensified in the last two weeks.
Most parts on the country have witnessed intense load-shedding over the last two weeks with some areas going for over eight hours in the dark.
ZESA says the power outages are due to maintenance works at Hwange.
This is despite ZESA's undertaking that the power utility will cope with the winter demand.
Hwange Thermal Power Station has given the power utility engineers a headache as it is currently generating 309 megawatts out of an installed capacity of 920 megawatts.
ZESA Holdings Group Chief Executive Officer Engineer Josh Chifamba says major maintenance works are being carried at the old power station with Unit 5 expected to be back to full throttle before month-end.
"We will have an improved supply of power during this winter period. At the moment we are having major maintenance works at Hwange and we believe before the month-end everything will be in place. We will be able to generate more power than we are doing now," said Engineer Chifamba.
Besides Hwange's 309 megawatts, Kariba is generating 739 mega watts as at this Thursday.
Harare coal-fired power station is contributing 30 megawatts to the national grid while Munyati Power Station is generating 16 megawatts.
Bulawayo power station is generating 24 megawatts.
The country is not importing any power.
Source - zbc
