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‘COP17 vs the grim realities of South Africa’s emissions’

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The core of the struggle is between the country’s environmental and social health, writes Tristen Taylor. South Africa is at the front-line of climate and environmental justice; the core of the struggle is between the country’s environmental and social health and the dominant, high-carbon energy-industrial matrix intimately linked to globalised business interests. This is further complicated by levels of massive social inequality, an HIV/Aids pandemic, and widespread gender bias. Over the past three years there has been profound changes within South Africa’s emissions profile and future energy mix. Apart from an increase in the planned renewable contribution to the future energy mix (17,600MW by 2030 from roughly zero in 2009), the news is largely negative. South Africa’s emissions have risen to 542mt of CO2-eq in 2010 (from 440mt of CO2-eq in 2004) and are set to climb by at least 50mt of CO2-eq with the addition of the Medupi and Kusile coal-fired power stations by 2020.
It highly unlikely to meet the peak target of 470mt of CO2-eq in 2020, as set by the government’s long-term mitigation scenario (LTMS), will be met. Nor will the targets set out in the White Paper on climate change be met
(see http://www.earthlife.org.za/?p=1660).
If the rest of the world follows South Africa’s example, a three to five degrees global warming is almost certain. If India, China, Brazil, Russia and Mexico follow South Africa’s emissions pathway, as defined in the White Paper, and no other country produces any carbon dioxide, these countries alone will produce enough carbon to push the world above two degrees of warming in a mere 28 years.
Worrying notes in future energy planning are the addition 13,000MW from new coal-fired plants, a push to extend the lifespan of existing plants, and 9,600MW of new nuclear plants. The fossil fuel economy will still be firmly entrenched. In regards to nuclear, the current plans will incur significant risk in terms of health and safety, push up external debt, and will come at a massive opportunity cost.
As study after study has shown, nuclear power is extremely expensive and comes a great financial risk, with comparatively few job opportunities. We fully expect that the planned nuclear build programme, if not abandoned, will consume vast state resources and preoccupy Eskom for the next twenty years. Money, skills and energy will go to nuclear at the expense of renewable energy.
While South Africa is a major emitter of greenhouse gases (GHG), as stated above, it is slightly unique in that the majority its emissions can be attributed to only two corporations; the state-owned Eskom (a monopoly on generation, transmission and distribution of electricity) and the privatised Sasol (coal-to-liquids and gas-to-liquids). Essentially, South Africa does not have a problem with people flying too much, but rather a problem with two energy corporations, both with very strong state support.
While any solution to South Africa’s GHG emissions has to deal with these two entities, the situation is vast more complex than it seems; it goes to the heart of the South African and global economy and to fundamental issues of human rights. The South African economy still operates in terms of the Minerals-Energy Complex, largely unchanged for the past century.

If the rest of the world follows South Africa’s example, a three to five degrees global warming is almost certain.

This economic model relies upon cheap labour to mine South Africa’s large mineral deposits, and, in particular, inexpensive coal. This coal is then burnt as cheaply as possible in large, centralised power stations to provide subsidised electricity to mines and mineral benefaction processes (such as aluminium smelters) for export.
This was Eskom’s initial mandate—to provide cheap electricity to mines—in the 1920s, and nothing has fundamentally changed (only 17% of Eskom’s 38,000MW capacity goes to households, rich and poor, while over 68% goes to the mining and industrial sectors). In effect, the rest of the world benefits from South Africa exploiting its own population and environment through the low-cost production of key commodities such as coal, aluminium, ferro-chrome, platinum, and gold.
The heavily carbon intensive coal-to-liquids process (which is about one of the worst industrial processes in terms of the climate, Sasol’s Secunda plant held the distinction in 2008 of the world’s single largest point emitter of carbon dioxide) has been integrated into this process, as both a major consumer of goal and natural gas (mostly from Mozambique, but Sasol is looking into hydro-fracking shale gas in South Africa) and as a producer of liquid fuels.
With scarcity growing in oil markets and the price of oil rising, CTL and GTL have become major sources of profits. These technologies are spreading across the globe as Sasol has transformed from a South African company into a global energy corporation, noted for price-fixing in Europe (see http://www.earthlife.org.za/?page_id=1301). What was once just a South African problem, is now a problem for people in India, Brazil, China, Europe and the US.
This economic strategy is littered with perverse economic subsidies for climate change; from the pricing of electricity to tax breaks for heavy industry to low wages to lax environmental regulations (over 100 coal mining concerns are operating without a water licence) to massive environmental damage from Acid Mine Drainage, SOx, NOx, & VOC emissions, and uranium poisoning. One of the latest examples of this is the new co-generation draft regulations, which are poised to purchase generated electricity from coal companies (using discards unfit for Eskom’s power stations), paper/plantation & sugar companies, and other industrial concerns at rates up to six times what these companies pay for electricity.
And, what about the poor and marginalized, who account for the vast majority of the populace (the unofficial unemployment rate hovering at about 40%)? Two point five million households still do not have access to electricity. Those who do, often pay electricity at levels vastly higher than the likes Anglo-American or BHP Billiton, and experience regular disconnections. They often live downwind of polluting industrial concerns (shacks start at the gates Sasol’s Sasolburg plant) and end up using toxic water for cleaning, drinking, and irrigation.
South Africa is now one of the most unequal societies on the earth. If economics is the art of distributing wealth across of society, the artists have decided to keep most of the wealth for themselves. At the bottom of the slag heap are poor women. As Earthlife research launched in March 2011 showed (http://www.earthlife.org.za/?page_id=1530), gender has been totally ignored in energy and climate change policy within South Africa, despite being required to do per the Constitution, ignoring vast differences.


Tristen Taylor is the Project Coordinator at Earthlife Africa-Johannesburg Branch

– By Tristen Taylor, Earthlife

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