Drakenstein Municipality measures to protect essential services during power cuts

Western Cape Premier Alan Winde visited Paarl to assess emergency interventions implemented by the Drakenstein Municipality to protect essential services during rolling power cuts. It comes as South Africa and its citizens are once again plunged into stage 6 loadshedding.

Early in 2023, the Western Cape Government (WCG) released funding of nearly R89 million for municipalities to purchase generators to ensure essential services, such as sanitation and water treatment, are kept running during unprecedented levels of power cuts.

Two generators, purchased with the funds allocated by the WCG, have been installed at the Paarl Wastewater Treatment Works. “To have essential services denied to communities during power outages is not an option for us. We, along with local governments in our province, are investing heavily in measures to protect services, as far as possible,” said Premier Winde during a tour of the facility. He added, “It is encouraging to see our municipalities are able to help us mitigate the impact of the energy crisis. This is an investment in innovation and stability for municipal services.”

The municipality has also installed uninterrupted power supply (UPS) systems at 41 major traffic intersections across Paarl to keep traffic lights operational during loadshedding.

They are made up of:

• Inverter-battery packs which can withstand up to 4 hours of loadshedding at a time;
• They are stored in underground chambers;
• The UPS systems kick in automatically as the power goes off;
• They are protected by covers that can only be opened by municipal officials;
• They are linked to an application which detects if they are being tampered with by criminals
• In total, UPS systems will be installed at 47 intersections.

The Premier also conducted unannounced visits at the Klein-Drakenstein Clinic and Paarl East Police Station to see for himself how services are impacted amid loadshedding. Premier Winde said, “These visits are important to check on service delivery to our citizens. They allow me to see first-hand, from a citizen’s perspective, where services can be improved, and where we are excelling.” While the clinic did not have a generator, staff told the Premier they had learned to manage during power outages. “I applaud our healthcare workers for their dedication and their ability to adapt to loadshedding. But this situation is not acceptable. We as the WCG will continue working as hard as possible to make our province and services to communities energy resilient. It is bad enough that we must endure constant loadshedding. Our residents should not have to suffer and have services in critical areas like health and safety affected.”

The Paarl East Police Station is fitted with an emergency generator. But it is not sufficient to keep the power on throughout the entire station.