Energy giant Chevron offers Eskom a helping hand

US oil giant, Chevron has offered to assist South Africa’s troubled power utility firm, Eskom, with surplus diesel from its Cape Town refinery to power some of its generators.

The general manager for strategy at the its South African unit, Steve Hegarty, told the country’s Parliament’s trade and industry committee that Chevron had produced diesel and has reserved some for the struggling energy provider. This development will promote efficient supply of power, thereby ensuring that the company is not declared insolvent this financial year.
 

Eskom is struggling to supply Africa’s most advanced economy with power consistently. Its power stations break often due to lack of proper service. To manage the dire situation, it embarked on load shedding (controlled power cuts) scheme to avert the South African power grid from collapsing under pressure.

Financially, Eskom has been in tatters. It had long been rumoured to be broke and unattractive to investors. In March this year, rating agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) downgraded Eskom to junk status after the company’s CEO, Tshediso Matona and three other senior executives were suspended.

  

That, though, was dismissed by Brian Molefe, the newly-appointed CEO of Eskom. He explained that the state-owned firm had won a number of financial facilities, including government guarantees that have not been utilised and added that the government had pledged to assist Eskom with a grant of about R23 billion ($1.8 billion).