Anglo Platinum has announced that the power outages that struck across South Africa and affected two of its plants last week will not damage its production levels.

Smelters at the Waterval and Mortimer operations in Rustenburg were affected by the power outages, leading to concerns that the company's annual output would be lower than previously expected.

However, Anglo Platinum has moved to allay such fears and spokesman Simon Tebele told Reuters that the mining firm has enough "catch-up capacity" to cover the loss of output at the smelters during the power outages.

"We are going to load-shed, but we have enough capacity of resources to treat the stock," explained Mr Tebele.

The South African power company, Eskom, explained that the power outages were due to unseasonably cold weather, which caused a surge in demand for energy, together with wet coal stocks that meant they could not be fired up.

Mr Tebele said that Anglo Platinum is in constant communication with Eskom to ensure it is kept fully informed of any potential problems in power supplies.

Sources:
Angloplat says no impact from SAfrica power outages, 12/10/07
http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKL1249468320071012

Outages hit Anglo Platinum's smelters, 11/10/07
http://platinum.matthey.com/media_room/1192104016.html
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