Electricity has finally been produced for the first time from one of the units at the long-awaited Medupi power station, state-owned power utility Eskom said on Monday.

This could alleviate South Africa’s power problems, which have affected the country’s economy with incessant power outages.

Medupi is one of three large-scale power plants Eskom is building to decrease electricity lacks. However, the construction of Medupi has repeatedly been behind schedule because of labour unrest and technical glitches.

According to Reuters, Medupi, which is coal-fired, would be the first power station to be constructed in the country in more than two decades.

The complete 794 megawatts (MW) of Medupi’s unit 6 would be supplied into the South African national grid within the next three months, Eskom said.

“All required auxiliary services for the entire power station are ready to ensure that Medupi’s total output of 4.764 MW is fully synchronised,” Reuters quoted Tshediso Matona, Eskom CEO, as having said.

“Synchronisation, or first power production, involves connecting the generator in a unit to the national power grid so that its power is perfectly aligned with other generators,” Matona said.

Last month, Eskom called on its key customer base to cut power usage by 15 percent to allow the beleaguered President Jacob Zuma to deliver his State Of the Nation Address (SONA) without any power interruptions.