At dawn on Wednesday, South Africa was once again moved into Stage 6 power cuts. As winter bites, Stage 8 load shedding is 'still a possibility' -- albeit less likely, given the current performance of Eskom's fleet, the power utility says.

South Africans saw the resurgence of Stage 6 power cuts this week after a brutal cold front which led to icy conditions around the country caused the demand for power to "exceed what was anticipated" on Monday, Eskom said.

"The cold weather does drive up the demand for electricity but the cold weather was forecasted and the planning to meet the demand was in place. On Monday, 10 July, the demand for electricity did exceed the expected demand," the power utility said in response to questions from Daily Maverick on Wednesday.

"Unfortunately, the prolonged high demand and the failure of some generator units necessitated the implementation of higher stages of load shedding."

The country is currently experiencing Stage 4 and 6 power cuts. The higher stages of load shedding were implemented to balance the demand for electricity with supply, as well as for Eskom to "begin replenishing the depleted emergency reserves", it said.

In May, the power utility presented a worst-case scenario for the winter season and warned of possible Stage 7 and 8 outages between June and August.

But daily power cuts eased in the following weeks. This was largely because Eskom was doing less maintenance and because of...