The cold weather in South Africa, which brought rare snowfalls to Johannesburg during parts of that week, resulted in increased electricity usage nationwide, and the utility increased its evening peak forecasts by 500 MW as a result.
However, in part due to a public holiday, peak demands did not reach the high for the year which was 35,865 MW on 11th June 2012. Eskom reports that peak demand of 34,564 MW on Wednesday the 8th of August, the day prior to a national holiday, was met by available capacity of 37,926 MW.