Power cuts worsen after Hwange shuts down

By Lance Guma
22 February 2010

The Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) on Saturday issued a statement warning customers to expect extended power cuts following the complete shut down of the Hwange thermal plant. For the past two weeks the country has faced severe power cuts which have affected even Harare’s central business district.

ZESA blamed a series of faults on the regional power grid saying this had left the plant unable to produce any power. ‘These forced outages caused complete loss of generation at Hwange and in the process resulting in major equipment damage,’ the company said.

In the last 45 days ZESA said the plant had experienced 25 ‘instant shut downs’ which caused damage to equipment. ‘Once a machine is damaged, it takes between four and seven days for it to cool down before an assessment can be made, the period in which our valued customers also experience severe load shedding due to lack of generation,’ ZESA explained.

The country requires at least 2000 mega watts of electricity but is only able to produce around 1100 mega watts from both the Hwange and Kariba plants. Close to 500 mega watts are being imported from neighbouring countries like Mozambique and Zambia. At least US$4 billion is needed to build new power generation units and repair old ones.

Many Zimbabweans assumed the coming in of the coalition government would resolve problems around electricity, water, sanitation and health. That hope has turned out to be misplaced. The government remains technically broke having failed to attract outside help to rebuild shattered infrastructure mainly due to few real democratic reforms and ongoing repression.

Exiled businessman Gilbert Muponda said the country’s hostile investment climate was to blame for ZESA’s woes. Not many investors will be willing to risk pouring billions of dollars into a country beset by political squabbles and the failure of the ZANU PF regime to reform. He cited the recently gazetted indigenization law as another example of policies that discouraged outside investment.

Muponda said ultimately what was needed was the opening up of the energy sector to allow for independent players in the market. He said government should allow open tendering for companies that can build infrastructure and generate power into a national grid. Power generation required massive investment and the country was currently relying on equipment put in place before independence by Ian Smith’s regime.

Last month Energy Minister Elias Mudzuri ordered ZESA to stop exporting electricity to Namibia. ‘We can’t import power to export to Namibia when Hwange power station is not producing,’ Mudzuri said. In 2007 ZESA entered into a controversial deal with Namibia’s Nam Power, in which they received US$40 million to refurbish the Hwange power station. In return they were supposed to export electricity to Namibia.

‘That deal was for Hwange only and it must not affect the entire operations of the country. It can only be implemented if Hwange is properly running,’ Mudzuri said.