Monday, 18
April 2016: No load shedding is anticipated today as Eskom intends to meet the
country’s electricity demands while performing the requisite maintenance on its
power generating plants.
In 2000,
Government announced its intent to provide free basic services to indigent
households. In this regard various services including energy were identified as
basic services to be supported by Government's programmes with respect to
indigent households.
Free Basic
Electricity (FBE) was launched by the Government in 2003, with the aim to
support indigent households in meeting their basic energy needs. According to
the Free Basic Electricity policy an allocation of 50kWh per month should be
provided to all poor households connected to the national electricity grid.
This amount of electricity will be enough to provide basic water heating using
a kettle, basic ironing and power for a small television set and radio.
As of March
2015, the total number of customers configured for FBE was 1 177 250 but only
911 075 customers collected their FBE tokens (these include 20Amps, 60Amps, and
conventional configured customers). This amounts to a total of 870 060MWh of
FBE consumed in the 2014/15 financial year; compared to 960 348MWh FBE consumed
in the 2013/14 financial year.
FBE is
provided to households by municipalities and Eskom in those areas where they
supply. In areas where Eskom is the supplier, FBE is provided on behalf of
municipalities by Eskom. In such areas, the municipality enters into an
agreement with Eskom who then supplies households that are in the Eskom supply
areas within the municipal boundaries.
Users who
have prepaid electricity meters will be able to see when the free electricity
is used up and will then have to buy more electricity at their expense. Users
with conventional or credit meters will see a credit of 50kWh on their monthly
bill, which is the FBE units. Any additional use is billed as per the
applicable tariff. It is important to note that some municipalities give more
than 50kWh of FBE, in line with their resolutions.
We will
continue to provide regular updates on the state of the power system through
various media platforms.
ENDS