The Sunday News
Dumisani Nsingo, Senior Business Reporter
ZIMBABAWE Power Company (ZPC), a subsidiary of ZESA Holdings says it failed to achieve its projected power generation output for the first quarter of the year by about 20 percent largely due to the effects of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
In a statement on its official website, ZPC said it managed to generate 1293.86 Gigawatt hours (GWh) less than its target of 1608.25 GWh for the first quarter of the year.
“Given the operating environment, ZPC sent out 1293.86GWh against a target of 1608.25GWh, representing a negative variance of 19.55 percent. The output of 1293.86GWh is 21.56 percent below the output for the same period in 2019. We attribute this to the COVID-19 outbreak and its consequential lockdown, depressed generation at Kariba due to low lake levels and unavailability of Unit 6 and Unit 3 at Hwange throughout the quarter. The COVID-19 imposed lockdown resulted in interruption of maintenance works as contractors declared force majeure, delayed payments and delivery by contractors,” said ZPC.
Hwange Power Station (HPS) generated with an average of four units during the quarter and sent out 627.63GWh of energy missing its quarterly target by 32.63 percent.
“This is mainly attributed to the unavailability of Unit Six due to various challenges, thereby reducing plant availability. Unit Three major overhaul however, commenced on 28 October 2019 and is on-going despite delays due to lockdown,” said the company.
ZPC further stated that work on the HPS expansion project was continuing despite delay in procurement of equipment.
“Despite the ongoing challenges, we have ensured that the Unit 7 and 8 expansion project in Hwange continues although the overall schedule is slightly behind schedule with progress sitting at 41.5 percent. This is due to the effects of COVID-19 which have adversely affected the procurement and manufacturing of equipment. The Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) has had serious implications on the project progress as personnel cannot travel to or from China for manufacturing and procurement of equipment,” said the company.
ZPC is however currently riding on exemption of essential utilities in which Hwange expansion project falls under, to avail staff at site for business continuity.
“Certain controls for the containment of COVID-19 pandemic have been enforced at all sites to ensure safety of employees and contractors,” said the company.
@DNsingo
