Displaying items by tag: energy crisis

The government has announced that South Africa, battling crippling power blackouts, plans to add 2,500 megawatts of new nuclear generation. The country has Africa's only nuclear power station, but the Koeberg plant near Cape Town is currently only working at half capacity. The first of the new units will probably come on stream in 2032 or 2033. Electricity minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa said the extra nuclear power would be a significant milestone. He added that it would be part of the government action to ‘ending the existential challenge that is confronting the country’ over power shortages and long-term energy security. Rotating power cuts of up to twelve hours a day over the past fifteen years have badly hit the economy and the government's reputation as it heads into an election next year. National power company Eskom has been tainted by corruption and maintenance problems which have led to the power cuts. In a bid to extend the life of the Koeberg plant by twenty years, one unit was closed for nearly a year and the second unit was shut down for maintenance this week.

Liz Truss is being urged to relax the limits on earthquakes caused by fracking to kickstart an energy revolution. She is poised to end the fracking freeze, to make Britain energy independent by 2040. Fracking businesses are lobbying for limits on seismic activity to be substantially increased to kickstart the industry. Currently drilling must stop if tremors of 0.5 occur. Experts say those occur naturally and are often imperceptible above ground. Cuadrilla want equality with other industries. Geothermal energy can create earthquakes of higher magnitudes than 0.5. The USA allows magnitude 4 tremors. A 2012 report said magnitude 3 tremors were ‘felt by few people’. But when Cuadrilla’s Lancashire test caused a 2.9 tremor, homes shook and objects fell off of shelves. A petroleum geologist at Newcastle University said fracking had thus far not been a major source of earthquakes; coal mining had caused many times more.

Moldova has made history by buying gas from a source that was not Russia's Gazprom. The one million cubic metres came from Poland's PGNiG. Moldova will need much larger volumes if Russia cuts supplies, as it has threatened to do if they don’t agree to increased costs in a new contract. In the absence of a new deal Russia reduced supplies, prompting Moldova to declare a thirty-day state of emergency. Gazprom accused Moldova of ‘provoking a crisis’ and demanded repayment of a $709m (£514m) debt, which Moldova disputes. Officials say they would like to sign a new contract with Gazprom, but only if the terms are favourable. Negotiations continue. Moldova said PGNiG’s shipment was to test the ability of imported gas from alternative sources, and PGNiG was one of seven offers they had received. Critics accuse the Kremlin of hiking gas prices to punish Moldova for electing a pro-European president, Maia Sandu.

Gareth Stace, the director general of UK Steel, said that now was ‘not the time’ for Mr Johnson to go on holiday in Spain. He told him to ‘bang ministerial heads together’ after a row broke out between different departments as to how to resolve the energy crisis and stop factories having to cease production. The business secretary was accused of making misleading claims about offering energy bailouts to factories struggling with soaring costs. Mr Stace said the Government should ‘shield’ the steel industry from soaring energy costs in the short-term, or risk ‘a bigger bill for the taxpayer’. He said that the industry was not seeking subsidies, but an end to ‘policy costs’ to cover the transition towards renewables which have been ‘piled on - making them uncompetitive’. See also

Some churches in Lebanon cannot turn on the lights or run fans to combat the heat because of extreme fuel shortages. There have been times when they have not been able to meet because people do not have enough fuel to drive their car or cannot access public transport. Some have turned to solar power to keep some lights on. Unfortunately, only wealthy people have access to this technology. Lebanon is ideally situated for solar power, seeing about 300 days of sunshine per year. The power shortages mean Christians lose access to the internet, and therefore to Zoom meetings or Facebook Live which bring services to people unable to attend. After a year’s wait Lebanon finally formed a new government, but it remains unclear if the new officials will do much to stop corruption and help the people.