An electrical engineer is warning that City Powers load reductions could affect businesses output and their profits although its intention is to protect the grid from overload and total collapse.
While primarily affecting residences, these outages could significantly disrupt local businesses as well, Dr Andrew Dickson, engineering executive at CBI-electric: low voltage, says.
Businesses are keenly aware that when the power goes out, production stops, resulting in reduced output and lower profitability. However, for a number of companies operating in Johannesburgs industrial sector, the switch-off of machinery could render them unable to operate for extended periods as it can take equipment anywhere from a few hours to more than 24 hours to return to operation.
Dickson says with outages now occurring multiple times a day in parts of Johannesburg, this will bring business to a standstill and could even force several companies to close.
Moreover, this could have significant knock-on effects, especially as the citys businesses enable it to contribute around 14.9% to the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and 40% to the Gauteng province, while also employing approximately 2.13 million people.
