In South Africa, Common Power is uplifting community energy initiatives by young professionals to help address the energy crisis.
Since the start of South Africa’s energy crisis in 2007, we’ve experienced multiple waves of load shedding as the country’s demand for electricity exceeds its (fossil fuel -based, corporate) ability to supply. Also known as ‘rolling blackouts’ or ‘rotating outages’, load shedding describes when an energy utility company artificially reduces demand on the energy generation system by temporarily switching off the distribution of energy to certain geographical areas.
During these periods the power is rationed between different electrical grid areas across the country and within municipal areas, with some experiencing power outages typically lasting two to four hours.
