CEO Dan Marokane argues that as more businesses and households turn to solar and private suppliers, Eskom’s electricity demand will keep dropping. In 2024, usage fell by 3%, and Eskom expects that trend to continue for the next five years.
This means crisis for a utility Company already sitting on R400 billion ($22.3 billion) debt. The company needs new, energy-hungry customers to replace what it’s losing. Bitcoin miners and data centres fit that profile.
It wants to host large-scale computing projects like data/Mining centres to generate new revenue.
However, Eskom’s electricity is neither consistently affordable nor dependable. Unplanned breakdowns recently pushed outages past 15,000 megawatts (MW), the level Eskom warns would force 21 days of stage 2 load-shedding in winter. The utility has been relying on expensive diesel generators to keep power flowing. That’s not the kind of setup that attracts long-term investment from miners or tech companies.
There’s logic in trying to monetise unused power. But Eskom is trying to pitch a premium service while barely meeting basic supply. There is need to stabilize its operations first, before its ambitions in Bitcoin and tech will go far.
Analysts argue that this isn’t a growth plan yet—it’s a survival tactic. And it still boils down to Eskom doing the one thing it hasn’t managed: “Keeping the lights on”.
