Re-estimating the economic costs of loadshedding in South Africa in 2023

In 2020 Eskom commissioned Nova Economics to provide the utility with reliable and accurate estimates of the economic cost of load shedding (CoLS) that had occurred between 2007 to 2019. The objectives of the study were to update a previous estimate produced by Deloitte in 2009 and to explore how different sectors of the economy were impacted by load shedding.  Since 2019 however the frequency and severity of load shedding increased,  and quite dramatically since mid-2022. As such we felt it would be worthwhile re-estimating the relationship between load shedding and quarterly GDP growth over the period 2003 to 2023 (in R/kWh) and updating our estimates of the total cost.