On Thursday, 07 February 2019, Executive Mayor, Herman Mashaba had the pleasure of launching Sebenza Sub-Station in the north-east region of the City of Johannesburg.
Sebenza Substation is a buffer bulwark supply facility that was built to mitigate against power outages arising from electricity demand exceeding supply across the City.
This is a significant milestone in the multi-party government’s efforts to provide services that will improve residents’ quality of life through reliable power supply.
This also goes a long way in bolstering economic activity throughout the City, particularly with Johannesburg being a strategic driver for Gauteng and South Africa’s growth for jobs and ease of doing business.
The City invested in excess of R1.2 billion for the new state of the art substation to benefit residents living in Modderfontein, Gresswold, Sandringham, Alexandra, Athol Oaklands, Rosebank, Melrose and Parkhurst.
The multi-party government inherited an electricity network that required urgent attention. In many parts, infrastructure had been built decades ago for communities that have now grown substantially in size. 27% of the City’s bulk transformers have been running past their Useful Lifespan, producing a staggering 177 000 low voltage outages in 2017/18.
This project is rooted in the Diphetogo strategy of addressing the enormous inherited infrastructure backlogs that plague communities with service delivery disruptions.
The project in its entirety is comprised of four transformers. However, the substation will work with three transformers with the capacity of 315MVA each in the interim. The fourth transformer will be installed at a later stage, which will then connect to a 400kV network in totality.
The significance of the work at the Sebenza Substation is intrinsically linked to the broader project of change in our City.
I have said it before and I’ll say it again – A Johannesburg that works is a South Africa that works. That is a key message that I have continued to drive as part of my commitment to stimulating the economy towards 5% economic growth by 2021.
It demonstrates not just the scale of the inherited challenges but also the impact the multi-party government is achieving to provide quality services to our residents.