As winter approaches, the usual dread of blackouts hangs in the air.

But this year, there’s a glimmer of hope.

South Africans might just get through the cold season without load shedding—at least, that’s what Electricity and Energy Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa is cautiously suggesting.

Energy Minister Shares Hopeful Outlook

Speaking at the G20 Energy Transitions Working Group in Cape Town this week, Ramokgopa shared that improved electricity generation and the return of key power units could mean a much more stable power supply this winter.

While he didn’t make any bold promises, his tone was noticeably more optimistic than in previous years.

Why This Winter Might Be Different

Ramokgopa pointed out that several big power units will be back online—units that weren’t available during last year’s winter.

For starters, Kusile Unit 6, which provides 800 megawatts, is up and running this time around.

And by the end of May, Medupi Unit 4—another 800MW source—will also be back after being offline for almost four years.

Add to that the expected return of both Koeberg nuclear power station units, and the total boost in generation is projected to be around 2,500 megawatts more than what South Africa had at its disposal during last winter’s peak.

Detailed Winter Forecast Coming Soon

While the Minister didn’t go into too much detail, he did say that a more comprehensive winter energy outlook will be shared on 5 May.

In the meantime, he emphasized that performance levels are not expected to dip below last year’s, and may even improve.

“There’s no reason why we should do worse than last year,” he told EWN.

But South Africans Are Right to Be Skeptical

Despite the hopeful tone, recent events have left many people feeling wary.

Just last week, Eskom reintroduced Stage 2 load shedding—the first in over a month.

The reason? A mix of unit failures and higher-than-expected demand.

Fortunately, the blackouts were short-lived.

By Friday morning, generation capacity had recovered enough for Eskom to suspend the load shedding.

Still, the incident reminded everyone just how fragile the energy situation remains.

Maintenance Still a Major Factor

Ramokgopa acknowledged that South Africa’s Energy Availability Factor (EAF) was still below where it should be in April.

He attributed the latest round of challenges to typical post-maintenance glitches.

Even after planned outages, he explained, it’s common for some units to return with technical issues.

That said, he remains confident:

“I really don’t foresee that we are going to perform below what we did last year.”