How Load Shedding Affects Your Geyser

Load shedding doesn’t just mean no hot water while the power’s out — the repeated on-off cycling it forces on your geyser has real, cumulative effects on the appliance itself.

Thermostat and element strain

Every time power cuts and returns, your geyser’s element switches off mid-cycle and then has to work harder to bring the water back up to temperature once power resumes. Repeated over months of load shedding, this extra cycling adds wear to the thermostat and heating element faster than normal use would.

Increased electricity use

A geyser reheating water from a partially cooled state after every outage uses more electricity overall than one that’s able to maintain a steady temperature — the opposite of what most households are trying to achieve.

Pressure valve wear

Repeated heating cycles can also mean the pressure relief valve activates more often than it would under normal, stable operation, which shortens its working life.

What helps

• A geyser timer, so the unit isn’t trying to heat water during scheduled outages it can’t avoid anyway
• Geyser blankets and pipe insulation, which reduce heat loss between cycles so less reheating is needed
• A heat pump instead of a standard element, which uses a fraction of the electricity to heat the same water and copes better with intermittent power
• Regular servicing, since a geyser under this extra strain benefits from more frequent element and valve checks than one running under stable power

If your geyser has been through a few years of load shedding, it’s worth having it checked even if it seems to be working fine — the wear tends to build up quietly before it causes a failure.