City Power bleeding

WOES: BUCKLING UNDER AGEING INFRASTRUCTURE, ELECTRICITY THEFT

- Thando Nondywana

Joburg's City Power is losing billions annually due to aging infrastructure, electricity theft and billing failures as the utility admits challenges facing the city's electricity supply.

Over the past year, technical losses amounted to R1.5 billion while nontechnical losses exceeded R2 billion.

At a media breakfast session at its Fordsburg depot, City Power CEO Tshifularo Mashava acknowledged the utility's financial strain and outlined measures to secure funding, improve revenue collection and modernise the power grid.

She said one of their biggest challenges was outdated infrastructure and the lack of advanced technology for remote monitoring and operations.

"To address this, we have invested heavily in our secondary plant, increasing visibility from 40% to 100%," she said.

"With better visibility, we can remotely manage operations more efficiently. However, with old infrastructure, residual faults occur. When we switch power back on at substations, faults can still happen down the line."