POWER July 2010 - 8

Is Eskom Ready for the World Cup?
The FIFA World Cup, the biggest sports event on the planet, is
under way in South Africa through July 11. More than 300,000
fans are expected to attend the global soccer tournament, and
hundreds of millions more will be watching on television. But
a focus will also be on South Africa itself, which 20 years ago
ended apartheid and has spent the following decades in a recovery
process. And the pressure is on for Eskom, South Africa's
state-owned utility, which generates nearly 95% of the nation's
power (and 45% of Africa's total).
The continent's most robust economy was in dire straits in early
2008, when gripped by a power crisis that forced major metal
mines to close and sent South Africa's gross domestic product
into a downward spiral. Blaming the crisis on rising electricity
demand and a lack of investment in new capacity that resulted
from years of neglect, the utility has since recommissioned
mothballed power plants and launched a massive power expansion
program. (See " Whistling in the Dark: Inside South Africa's
Power Crisis " in our Nov. 2008 issue.) The first new power plants
are not expected to come online until 2012 (Figure 1), however.
Despite internal audits and simulations to test its readiness for
the World Cup-including an independent review conducted by
the Korean Electricity Power Corp. (Korea and Japan co-hosted the
2002 World Cup)-Eskom remains wary about supply, admitting
that the country's reserve margin is not as wide as it would like.
Just a month before the tournament began, the utility warned
that, though it did not foresee any blackouts, " cold winter temperatures
combined with high electricity demand " could place additional
pressure on the system. Consumers should also be on the alert,
it said, introducing a warning system on public television channels
where a referee holds up colored cards that indicate the power situation.
The utility even went so far as to suggest that South Africans
could be asked to turn everything off but one TV and one light during
the tournament if the system were under pressure.
According to Eskom, demand is expected to peak at 37.2 GW, with
1. When it rains, it will pour. The six units at Eskom's 4,800MW
Medupi coal-fired power plant, under construction in Lephalale, are
expected to come online between 2012 and 2015. The project, with a
name that means " rain that soaks parched lands, giving economic relief, "
will include South Africa's first supercritical plant. A similar 4,800-MW
coal-fired plant, the Kusile, is also under construction in Lephalale, with
the first unit expected to come online in 2014. That plant will be South
Africa's first plant to install flue gas desulfurization. Courtesy: Eskom
an increase of only 275 MW anticipated from the World Cup, based on
studies conducted in Germany during the last World Cup, in 2006.
The utility has gone to extraordinary measures to ensure
supply: It said that game broadcasts will be powered by diesel
generators to avoid any disruptions, while uninterrupted power
supply units will back up the lighting at the stadiums. As well as
pledging that " only critical maintenance " would take place over
the period of the World Cup, Eskom has reportedly secured supply
of around 42 GW for the event, including its own capacity, by
reducing exports and increasing imports, mainly from Mozambique's
Cahora Bassa dam. Demand reduction commitments from
big industrial consumers have also been obtained. Worst case
scenarios would prompt the utility to activate open-cycle gas
turbines, which could supply an additional 2,000 MW.
In June, meanwhile, at a presentation pinpointing the utility's
status on its path to recovery, Eskom Acting Chairman Mpho
Makwana said the utility was determined to " shine again, not
just survive. " Makwana pointed out that despite being tight,
the power system had performed reasonably well, with no load
shedding since May 2008. To increase capacity, Eskom has added
450 MW (mainly from independent power producers) and added
new transmission lines, and it is on schedule-though not on
budget-to increase capacity by 12 GW by 2017.
Perhaps more telling of the utility's status is that the World Bank
and other organizations had loaned it R68 billion (US$8.76 billion)
for its new coal plants and renewable projects. And the utility actually
pulled itself out of the red, from a record loss of R9.7 billion in
2009 to a net profit of R3.6 billion in fiscal year 2010. The gains
were mainly from an increase in tariffs granted by the national energy
regulatory authority, Makwana said.
Abengoa Solar Begins Operation of
50-MW Parabolic Trough Plant
Abengoa Solar in early May began commercial operation of Solnova
1, the company's first 50-MW parabolic trough plant. Covering
980,000 square feet with mirrors requiring an area totaling
280 acres (Figure 2), it is one of five planned concentrating solar
2. A sunny place. Spanish company Abengoa Solar began commercial
operation of a 50-MW parabolic trough plant at the Solúcar Platform
in Andalucía. The Solnova 1 project comprises 360 collectors. Each is 150
meters long and consists of 28 mirrors. Abengoa said that the troughs
were assembled using a " lean manufacturing system, " which enabled one
quality collector module to be produced every 30 minutes. Solnova 1 is
one of five projects planned for construction at the Solúcar Platform. Work
is in progress on the Solnova 3 plant solar field. Courtesy: Abengoa Solar
8
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POWER July 2010

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