WHAT??
Yes, you read it right.
For this post, you are going to have to use that grey matter between your ears – but it will be worth it!
This Could Be The Biggest Scam Ever?
So, follow this train for a few minutes.
There are 7 million geysers in South Africa and on average each of those is rated at 3000W or 3kW.
Without load shedding, geysers will switch on and off between 15-30 times per day, depending on hot water usage and we also know that geysers consume around 50%-60% of total household energy in an average month.
As the water in the geyser slowly loses heat due to natural thermodynamics ( warmer air from the hot water moves into the colder air around the geyser and this causes the water temperature to drop), the geyser switches on to reheat the water and maintain it at the set temperature which is around 65 degrees.
For every 20 minutes the geyser is on, it will use 1kWh of electricity and for every hour that it runs, it will use 3kWh of electricity.
At an average of R2/kWh , your geyser uses around R2 for every 20 minutes it runs- for an hour, that cost is R6.
Remember that this consumption is without load shedding.
An average geyser would use around 360kWh per month or around 12kWh per day or about R720-R800 per month.
Enter Left: Load Shedding
Your geyser relies on constant energy supply to maintain it’s temperature, but as load shedding takes effect for between 6-8 hours per day on stage 4 and 10 hours per day on stage 6, this affects the ability of the geyser to maintain it’s temperature.
So, where your geyser would have all the power it wants to keep heating water, now it has no power for up to 10 hours.
When your geyser suddenly loses 10 hours of electrical supply, the water inside the geyser will cool more than usual and here is where the money comes rolling in!
Follow The Money
If your geyser only works for an extra 20 minutes per day due to load shedding, that’s an extra 1kWh you’re paying for!
Now, that’s just R2/day you may say – but multiply that by 30 days and that’s R60 per month extra you’re paying.
That’s not much , you might say.
Multiply that by 7 million geysers.
R420 million per month.
Get it?
And even worse, is that I discussed this very topic with SA’s leading energy expert and he agreed that this is indeed a spin-off of load-shedding.
So I am not making this shit up.
But, you may argue, this is just a side-effect, like a hangover from drinking, but what if it’s not.
The beauty of this scam is , that we , the South African Sheep…er public , see load-shedding as the result of an inept, incompetent , corrupt government but meanwhile it could be a very carefully considered and structured profit making scheme on a grand scale all and the guise of abject incompetence!
Still Not Convinced?
Ok, now consider this.
If Eskom has many of it’s generating units offline, they are not incurring operational costs. No fuel, no coal, no gas = less money spent on operating costs = more profit.
Simple business economics. Incur lower expenses while increasing revenue = more profit. Bus. Ec 101.
So, geysers use more power because there isn’t enough electricity supply to keep them going; consumers buy more power even if only a little and ESKOM reduces it’s operating expenses on a massive scale as a good percentage of their generating fleet is ‘unavailable ‘ or ‘on breakdown’.
Makes you think, doesn’t it.
And we thought this government were simply corrupt and incompetent…
And that’s the Joburg Truth.