Africa-Press – Zambia. ZESCO Limited is experiencing significant difficulties to balance the available power supply with demand due to the adverse El Niño effects. This has drastically suppressed hydro power generation at its major power stations.
To supplement this reduced power generation, ZESCO is taking up 105 Megawatts of power from Ndola Energy, importing up to 188W Megawatts from Mozambique and has gone further to reduce power exports from 520MW in February to 281MW in June, 2024.
However, the total available power of 1,268MW still falls short of the demand of 2,216MW (June 2024).
Further, the Corporation is prioritising critical loads to sustain industry, agriculture and essential services.
Owing to the above, the Corporation has to deploy emergency load management measures to sustain the power system.
The above scenario entails that ZESCO will have to ration power outside the planned timings.
The present power generating status is as follows:
Kafue Gorge:
372MW against capacity of 990MW
Kafue Gorge Lower: 179MW against installed capacity of 750MW
Kariba North Bank: 98MW against installed capacity of 1,080MW
ItezhiTezhi PC:
34MW against installed capacity of 120MW
Ndola Energy:
105MW
Others Combined: 480MW
ZESCO regrets the inconvenience caused.
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