18th Mar 2022 09:05
(Alliance News) - Anglo American PLC on Friday said it has partnered with EDF Renewables to secure 100% renewable energy supply for its South Africa operations.
The project follows rolling blackouts in SA as public utility Eskom Holdings SOC Holdings Ltd struggles to keep the lights on, hurting the energy-heavy mining industry.
EDF Renewables is the SA subsidiary of French utility EDF Group.
Together, the two will develop a "a regional renewable energy ecosystem".
The project is expected to be designed to meet Anglo American's operational electricity requirements in SA through the supply of 100% renewable electricity by 2030.
It will focus on developing on-site and off-site solar and wind farms, and will include between 3 gigawatts and 5 GW of renewable electricity and storage over the next decade.
"We are targeting carbon neutrality across our operations by 2040 and we are making good progress. Today's announcement is a further major step towards addressing our on-site energy requirements - the largest source of our operational emissions," said Anglo Chief Executive Mark Cutifani.
Anglo American shares were up 2.3% to ZAR727.55 each in Johannesburg on Friday morning. In London, the stock was up 1.3% to 3,701.50 pence each.
Last year June, SA President Cyril Ramaphosa gave the go-ahead to raise the threshold of embedded generation licence cap for private companies from 1 megawatt to 100 MW.
With embedded generation, the government will allow private companies to produce energy for their own use in their own plants and potentially to supply excess capacity to the national grid.
Loadshedding implemented by Eskom has continued into 2022, with the most recent bout ending last Friday.
The embattled state-owned power utility faces a slew of challenges due to its ageing coal-fired power plants that keep breaking down. Two new power stations - Kusile and Medupe - are fraught with massive defects.
In a separate release, Anglo American announced the commissioning of the Benguela Gem diamond recovery vessel in Namibia. This was completed ahead of schedule and below budget.
The Benguela Gem will add an additional 500,000 carats of diamonds to annual marine production, an increase of around 45%, following an investment of about USD420 million as part of a 50:50 joint venture between Anglo American diamond subsidiary De Beers Group and the Namibian government.
Anglo American paid around USD210 million towards the vessel.
The vessel will form part of Debmarine Namibia's fleet. Debmarine Namibia is a subsidiary of Namdeb Holdings, a 50:50 joint venture between De Beers Group and the Namibian government. They operate off the off the south west coast of Namibia in the Atlantic 1 licence area.
The vessel deploys advanced subsea crawling – a technique for recovering diamonds from the seabed.
De Beers CEO Bruce Cleaver said: "The Benguela Gem is the first of its kind and represents an outstanding feat of engineering design, technology innovation and sustainability performance. The investment in this vessel will support a long term, sustainable future for Namibia's diamond sector, which is home to some of the most sought-after diamonds in the world."
In 2021, Debmarine Namibia recovered around 1.1 million carats of rough diamonds of total Namdeb Holdings production of around 1.5 million carats.
De Beers rough diamond production came in at 32.3 million carats, up 29% from 25.1 million in 2020.
By Greg Roxburgh; [email protected]
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