I'm not sure if a tale I was told the other day is an urban legend, or whether the story is really true, but like all myths, it sounds completely feasible.
Apparently, Eskom - and various municipalities - implement load-shedding through a rather archaic solution. A man in a van drives around from suburb to suburb turning off substations. This, I was told, is why some areas get their power back much later than they should: because the man in the van is stuck in traffic.
No doubt this traffic has been caused by the volume of robots that are no longer functional, thanks to the man in the van himself.
For some bizarre reason, I thought load-shedding, or rolling blackouts, would have been handled from some sort of centralised, computerised command centre. Yet, what I was told, together with anecdotal evidence, suggests otherwise.
Perfectly plausible
The man-in-the-van scenario makes perfect sense when one considers that people's experience of load-shedding is hardly congruent with what Eskom - or municipal - schedules state. I've lost count of the number of times I was just about to pop a meal onto the stove, only to end up in the dark, holding a pack of defrosted mince.
And then there is the gap between when the four hours of darkness is meant to end, and when the lights finally come back on. These two issues lend credence to the man-in-the-van tale, and also speak to significant IT failings within Eskom and our municipalities. All 20-odd of them.
Johannesburg's City Power has come up with what it reckons is a solution to this dilemma. Around a total of 150 000 smart meters will be installed in homes by October, adding to the 65 000 already in place. The plan, according to the utility, is to use the meters to monitor use and then warn customers - via a series of debilitating 30-second outages - to reduce the load. "Turn off geysers, extra lights, and the pool pump and we won't shed you," seems to be the message.
I've lost count of the number of times I was just about to pop a meal onto the stove, only to end up in the dark, holding a pack of defrosted mince.
Totally brilliant. I'd much rather have that option than four hours of darkness, although City Power's solution is likely to kill my PC and other sensitive electronic equipment I foolishly thought I could use.
Yet, there is an issue with this sort of solution. Just ask some of the people who already have smart meters. Apparently, many are not even plugged into anything, and that's assuming cellphone reception is up to scratch. Yup. Dumb meters.
Back to basics
None of these failings, though, are altogether surprising when one considers the mess Eskom's IT department is in; or the fact that municipalities can't send out accurate bills, despite installing the latest, greatest, super-duper software.
All these issues speak to an inability to get things right, right from the very start. Smart meters require a proper ICT network in place, with a central control room so all the data can be handled and interpreted.
Selling electricity directly to end-users, as Eskom's new head Brian Molefe has apparently proposed, also requires something way more than what seems to be a slapdash approach to technology.
Selling directly means adding millions and millions of people to the customer base. It requires software that people can use, systems that don't accept messed-up meter readings, and the ability to cleverly divine that someone who normally uses 200kWh a month has not suddenly set up a nuclear smelter in his/her backyard.
Even if Molefe's plan is just prepaid smart meters, it also implies a level of technology I don't think the state is ready to implement at the moment.
Sorry, dear government, but the solution to the current power 'non-crisis' is not to plug tech into an already dysfunctional system; it's to make sure you have all the building blocks in place so the tech will just work, on an automated basis, without disrupting our lives any further.
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