The world’s largest plant that sucks carbon dioxide directly from the air and deposits it underground is due to start operating on Wednesday, the company behind the nascent green technology said. Swiss start-up Climeworks, which specialises in capturing carbon dioxide directly from the air, has partnered with Icelandic carbon storage firm Carbfix to develop a plant that sucks out up to 4 000 t/y of carbon dioxide (CO2).
David Masondo, South Africa’s deputy finance minister, suggested that investors forgive about R146-billion of sovereign debt in exchange for the national power utility meeting climate targets. In order to transition from the use of coal to generate electricity to renewable energy Eskom Holdings will need to borrow about R400-billion, equal to its current debt, and will need a “complementary transaction” to achieve that, he said in a speech on Tuesday.
Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment Minister Barbara Creecy reported on Tuesday that South Africa’s revised Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), which is to be deposited with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change later this year, is close to being finalised and will be presented to lawmakers “very soon”. In a briefing of the Portfolio Committee on Environment, Forestry and Fisheries, on the country’s preparations ahead of the COP26 climate negotiations scheduled for Glasgow, Scotland, in early November, Creecy reported that her department was in the process of synthesising the comments received during the public comment period, including those made by the Presidential Climate Commission (PCC).
Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe has appointed Advocate Nomalanga Petronella Sithole as CEO and full-time regulator member of the National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa). Sithole’s appointment is for a five-year period, effective from August 25.
The Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC) has established the South African Metering Industry Association (Samia).
Since the designation of both residential electricity and water meters have created employment, and has benefited component manufacturing industries, the DTIC thought it well to establish the association.
The National Executive Committee (NEC) of the African National Congress (ANC) has given its backing to the just energy transaction being pursued by State-owned electricity producer Eskom. In closing remarks following the NEC’s September lekgotla, ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa said that the lekgotla welcomed the detailed planning Eskom had done for a just energy transaction at one power station, which “would ensure that workers and community wellbeing was assured and advanced in this process”.
Russian civil nuclear shipping and floating nuclear power plant company Atomflot, part of the State-owned Rosatom nuclear group, has signed a preliminary agreement with mining company GDK Baimskaya to provide four small modular reactors (SMRs) to power the miner’s Baimskaya copper and gold development, World Nuclear News has reported. The project is located at a remote site in the Chukotka region of Russia’s far east arctic. (GDK Baimskaya is a subsidiary of KAZ Minerals, itself part of the …
Renewable energy company Scatec Solar has signed a two-year lease agreement with Engie to provide a mobile plug-and-play solar photovoltaic (PV) plant at its hydrogen production plant at Anglo American Platinum’s Mokalakwena mine, in Limpopo.
Scatec launched its Release by Scatec service in September 2019 – a service through which it offers industrial players in emerging markets access to flexible, reliable and low-cost power.
Renewable energy company Solar Capital has appointed the Row2Rio ocean rower Zirk Botha country manager of its South African operations.
Solar Capital is a subsidiary of the Phelan Energy Group.
ACWA Power, one of Saudi Arabia’s main vehicles for building renewable energy projects, said meetings with potential investors ahead of an initial public offering have gone “very well.” The company, half-owned by the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, is pushing ahead with an IPO it’s been discussing for years, CEO Paddy Padmanathan said in an interview with Bloomberg TV. Over the next five years, the company will double the amount of power it generates, mostly from renewable sources amid a global shift away from burning fossil fuels, he said.
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