The dark days in South Africa may be back. Consumers have been warned of possible unexpected power cuts after unit two at Koeberg nuclear power station was switched off on Monday night. A technical fault has caused the unit to be switched off. Charles Kadalie, manager of public lighting for Cape Town, said: “Consumers must dust off their load-shedding schedules. We’re at a high-warning stage.” Once those responsible have issued such a warning we can be sure that we are going to be experiencing some problems soon.

If something was to go wrong with unit one at Koeberg then we would be plunged into darkness. Let us hope that we do not get to that stage anytime soon as electricity demands continue to increase do to the winter conditions currently being faced. Many had thought that the electricity problems in South Africa would be worse in winter due to the increase in demand of electricity. But so far there have not been any serious problems up until now with this warning from Eskom.