Feb 17, 2021
A photograph in the entrance hall at Komati Power Station shows the plant in better times, its nine generating units belching steam and smoke into the night sky.
Those days are never coming back: Komati’s sole remaining working unit is facing closure within two years under plans by state power utility Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. to shut about a quarter of its coal-fired capacity by 2030. Next door at the Goedehoop mine, arrays of solar panels line the main access road, a sign of what may be to come for South Africa’s coal belt.
The blackouts suffered by swathes of the U.S. this week show what’s at stake for even the world’s most advanced economies in getting the transition to cleaner energy right. In South Africa, for decades almost all the electricity needed to power Africa’s most industrialized economy has been produced by a fleet of aging coal-fired plants constructed alongside the mines to the east of Johannesburg. That’s made the province of Mpum
The export of South African coal to China is poised to continue while China decides not to buy Australian coal, Glencore CEO Ivan Glasenberg said during this week’s Glencore media conference.
“China still imports round about 185-million tons to 190-million tons of seaborne coal. They like to import the better quality coals, and therefore to substitute the Australian better quality coal. Indonesia and Russia do supply them, but they need other sources of supply once Australia is out of the market,” Glasenberg said in response to Mining Weekly.
“South Africa has picked up a good portion of the Australian coal that went into China. We’re shipping round about two to three Capes a month into China and hopefully that will continue while the spat continues between China and Australia.
“Naturally those tons that we now move to China means less tons for India, which means Australia will be supplying those tons that went to China to India. So, the trade rou
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Indian power generation from coal fell to a 5-year low of ‘just’ 1064 TWh in 2020 due to the COVID-19-induced slowdown. This was only a dip, however, as coal still makes up 70% of the country’s total electricity production and is set to come back with a vengeance, growing by 43% to 1523 TWh in 2037, when Rystad Energy expects coal power to finally peak.
As surprising as the projection may be to some, such a surge in coal consumption is not that unexpected. India’s power generation is set to grow exponentially to 3565 TWh by 2037, more than double 2020’s figure. Electricity production will already exceed 2000 TWh from 2025 and is set to breach the 3000 TWh ceiling from 2034 as a result of an electrification boost and economic growth.
CHARLESTON — The following events happened on these dates in West Virginia history. To read more, go to e-WV: The West Virginia Encyclopedia at www.wvencyclopedia.org.