Africa

When President Jacob Zuma appointed Elizabeth Dipuo Peters to the post of Energy Minister in 2009 one of the key performance areas he asked her to progress was getting greater private sector involvement in power generation.

1994 will undoubtedly forever be the year that mankind associates with the modern South Africa. One does not need to be a historian to know that it was here that the days of apartheid slowly came to end, resulting in the multi-racial democratic election that brought Nelson Mandela and his African National Congress (ANC) to power.

It is fair to say that until recently Kenya was not generally renowned for being a destination for mining investment. However now, with the world’s eyes focused firmly on Africa as an epicentre for mining activities, Kenya is emerging as a location of particular interest in the wake of developments that have proven that the country does indeed hold significant mineral-based potential.

Since we last spoke to Roman Crookes, project manager of the R105 billion Medupi power station, he has refereed a game of two halves. The press has had a field day throughout the three years since June 2010, and any observer could be forgiven for thinking the site has been a battlefield. However in every problem lies an opportunity, and it was good to get a chance to hear firstly about the achievements of the project, then about the good that has come from the setbacks that have been encountered.

The licence has been granted by the Ethiopian Ministry of Mines following a detailed review by it and other government departments of the Project’s Feasibility Study and Environmental, Social and Health Impacts Assessment (ESHIA), which was approved in May 2013 by the Ethiopian Environmental Protection Authority and Ministry of Mines.

The first mains electricity that flowed in Zambia came from a small coal fired station in the capital Livingstone, but even that did not cover the entire city. Zambia had to wait till 1938 to get its first hydro-electric power from that mighty power source, the Victoria Falls. Of course the copper mines needed power, but up to the middle of the last century they had to provide their own generation facilities.

The agreement will see CNOOC develop the Kingfisher oil field over a period of four years. The field itself is thought to hold some 635 million barrels of oil, of which 196 million are recoverable.

According to Peter Lokeris, Uganda's junior energy minister, the field will have an initial capacity to produce between 30,000 to 40,000 barrels of oil per day.

The First Quantum Minerals (FQM) story began in the late 90s and spans humble beginnings from a tailings retreatment process at Bwana Mkubwa in Zambia, to its present day achievable aspiration to be one of the world’s leading copper producers. The financing and development of Kansanshi marked the transition of the company to a fully fledged miner and the beginning of a spectacular growth story for the company over the last decade.

Founded in 1876 and today headquartered in Düsseldorf, Germany, Henkel is a recognised holder of globally leading market positions in the consumer and industrial businesses. Boasting a host of reputable brands including Persil, Schwarzkopf and Loctite, Henkel has some 47,000 employees operating throughout the world across the group’s three business sectors; laundry and home care, beauty care and adhesive technologies.

A project without equal

John Gladston, Trident Resource Optimisation Manager, discusses the history and growth of the Trident project, the largest single investment project that Zambia has ever witnessed.

“Trident represents the biggest single project investment in Zambia that has ever occurred, totalling some $2 billion,” states John Gladston, Trident Resource Optimisation Manager. “As is typical of First Quantum, the project is going great guns and is progressing on-time and to budget.”