Energy: SA ditches 'dirty' coal
2008-07-28 21:27
Cape Town - Government said on Monday it would move away from cheap coal - long the engine of South Africa's economic growth - and embrace nuclear and renewable energy in a bid to combat climate change.
South Africa relies on its coal mines for 90 percent of its energy and has sought to attract electricity guzzling industries such as aluminum smelters as a key plank of its foreign investment policy.
But Environment Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk said that would now change under a newly agreed cabinet policy.
"We are saying to business and society at large that we have to move away from dirty coal as a dominant energy source," he said. Instead, the government would promote greater use of renewable energy and nuclear fuel.
"The longer we wait the more expensive it will become," he told a news conference.
Devastation
Africa is the continent expected to be hardest hit by global warming. According to UN climate projections, the western part of South Africa faces increasing drought and declining crop yields, while the eastern part risks more torrential rain and flood-related devastation.
In the Kruger National Park, a temperature increase of 2.5 to 3 degrees Celsius could lead to the extinction of more than one quarter of its mammal and bird species and decimate butterfly populations. Cape Town's fruit and wine industries could become history, and its famed fynbos vegetation devastated.
Like other developing countries, South Africa is pushing the United States and other industrialised countries blamed for most of the global warming to slash their greenhouse gas emissions. Van Schalkwyk said developed countries must agree to cut emissions by 25 to 40 percent of 1990 levels by 2025 and by 85-90 percent by 2050. This has so far been resisted.
South Africa and other developing countries must also play their part, van Schalkwyk said. If the country took concerted action now, its greenhouse gas emissions should stabilize by 2025 and then begin to decline. Without government intervention, emissions might quadruple by 2050, he said.
No job losses
He said that environmental benefits would offset the economic costs, with government models indicating there would be no net job losses in a country struggling with nearly 30 percent unemployment.
Van Schalkwyk said the government would come up with concrete measures by next year - including mandatory energy saving measures and a possible carbon tax.
He indicated there would be no immediate impact on state utility Eskom's plans to build a new coal-fired power station by 2013 and bring two obsolete ones back into production to offset an acute electricity shortage caused by rising demand and lack of planning. But he said that, in the future, the government would only allow the construction of new power generators which were committed to "capturing" carbon dioxide emissions.
South Africa has the cheapest coal-fired energy in the world, at 22 cents per kilowatt/hour, compared with solar energy at 46 cents and wind energy at 57 cents.
The government has long used this as an excuse not to invest in alternative forms of energy even though the country is sunny and with a long, windy coastline that make it ideal for solar and wind power.
The country's first wind farm near Cape Town came into operation only this year and will produce only a fraction of national energy needs. It uses four wind turbines, compared with the 19 000 used in Germany, which is the same size as the Western Cape province.
The government is also investing heavily in nuclear power and has asked US and French companies to build a second nuclear plant alongside one near Cape Town. Van Schalkwyk said South Africa would continue to push the nuclear option.
He described South Africa's greenhouse gas goals as "progressive" compared with many other countries.
"This cabinet decision is sending a very strong message that, as a government and country, we are committing ourselves to a low carbon economy," he said.
- AP
- AP