South Africa's state power company Eskom seeks to support Bitcoin mining and other businesses to cope with operational crisis

PANews reported on July 1 that according to MSN, South Africa's national power company Eskom is considering supporting Bitcoin mining, artificial intelligence and data center businesses to cope with the operating crisis. The company's CEO Dan Marokane pointed out that as the popularity of renewable energy leads to a continued decline in electricity sales (a 4% drop in 2024), new sources of income need to be developed to ease the pressure of 403 billion rand (about 22.7 billion US dollars) debt.

South Africa's power grid is still facing a power supply crisis, with an average unexpected power outage of 15,076 megawatts from June 13 to 19, which may trigger the second-level power rationing measures in winter. Eskom plans to learn from the experience of Texas, the United States, and use the interruptible power consumption characteristics of Bitcoin mines to balance the power grid load.