The City of Johannesburg’s power utility City Power will spend more than R500 million over the next three years to upgrade six power substations, adding 1 000 MVA (Mega Volt Amps) to the city’s capacity on completion, a senior official said on Wednesday.
The city’s member of the mayoral committee (MMC) for Environment and Infrastructure Services, Matshidiso Mfikoe, said the existing network, which was more than 40 years old, had limited capacity to meet increased power demand in the region.
"The equipment has reached the end of its useful life and there are no more spares available or being manufactured. In the event of power outages, it took longer than necessary to restore power,” she said.
"We are upgrading the network to make it flexible and robust. We are bringing the latest technology to enable City Power to remotely monitor the network from the control centre to prevent power outages or power loss. This will also help City Power to reduce maintenance costs and increase revenue,” she added.
The announcement comes at a time when South Africa’s struggling energy utility, Eskom, routinely faces power failures that are costing the country’s economy billions of rands.
The substations are in Roodepoort, Wilro Park, Kloofendal, New Fleurhof, Tshepisong and Princess.
