The SA Communist Party (SACP), an ally of the governing ANC, has lashed out at Europe for “double standards” for continuing to import coal from the country despite being staunch proponents of the just energy transition into cleaner energy sources.
“We will not tolerate the unjust notion of a ‘just energy transition’ pushed by imperialist-dominated institutions like the World Bank, IMF and World Economic Forum. Their interests do not align with the wellbeing of our people, and we reject their influence on our domestic energy policies,” SACP general secretary Solly Mapaila said on Sunday.
He was delivering the party’s keynote address at an event to commemorate its 102nd anniversary in Marikana in the North West.
Mapaila said: “Our vision for a genuine just transition is one that prioritises the needs of the majority, the workers and the poor. This vision includes the imperative to roll back deindustrialisation and industrialise our economy, to create employment at scale. We call for the eradication of energy poverty, affordable electricity access for all, and uninterrupted power supply.”
He called on the government to develop sustainable livelihoods along the electric power generation, transmission and distribution value chain and “significantly reduce inequality in the entire energy sector”.
“The recent decommissioning of the Komati power station underpinned by a World Bank loan without a viable replacement first put in place is a clear example of the double standards we face,” said Mapaila.
“As this happened, Europe, the ‘champion of green transition’, increased its coal imports from SA by approximately 720%, from half a million tonnes in the first half of 2021 to above 4-million tonnes in the first half of 2022. In a genuine just transition, there can be no double standards. No power station should be decommissioned until a suitable replacement, with equal or preferably greater capacity, work and sustainable livelihoods opportunities, is in place.”
Business Day previously reported that coal exports from SA’s Richards Bay Coal Terminal (RBCT), Africa’s largest coal export facility, to Europe increased more than six-fold to 14.3-million tonnes in 2022 from 2.3-million tonnes in 2021.
This was as European countries sought to secure alternatives to Russian supply.
However, despite the temporary increase in coal demand in Europe, the latest coal market report by the International Energy Agency says in the first half of 2023 the EU’s coal demand dropped by about 16% and for the full-year it is expected to decline by about 17%. The decrease was partly driven by “ample power production by renewable resources”.
Komati power station
Electricity minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa was widely criticised in July for saying SA was forced to shut down Komati power station in Mpumalanga in 2022 “because someone gave [SA] money and told us to decarbonise”.
The decision to begin Komati’s shutdown was taken in 2017, about five years before SA’s $8.5bn Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP) with developed countries to help SA transition from a high to low-carbon economy was announced.
The transition from a coal-based power sector to renewables will be integral to SA meeting is global emissions reduction commitments. Failure will see the country locked out of important export markets.
Eskom has previously said Komati was shut down because it had reached its end of life, but the utility has admitted to making mistakes in the decommissioning of Komati power station in Mpumalanga.
Komati power station was the first of Eskom’s coal-fired fleet to shut down and speaking at a recent event at Komati Eskom’s head of generation, Bheki Nxumalo, said the utility should have begun implementing initiatives to create jobs at the power station before it was shut down.
At the same event representatives from communities near Komati expressed concern over delays with Eskom’s just energy transition plans to bring new opportunities and “green jobs” to this part of the country, the first to be affected by SA’s gradual move from a coal-dominated to a renewables-dominated power mix.
The Sunday Times reported in June that mineral resources & energy minister Gwede Mantashe, who is described as a coal fundamentalist by his opponents, snubbed a top-level meeting with European leaders hosted by President Cyril Ramaphosa to launch a European-funded green-energy initiative.
Instead of joining Ramaphosa to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Danish and Dutch prime ministers, Mantashe attended a Cosatu event in Boksburg.
Mantashe later said he did not sign the MOU because he doesn’t “sign agreements I have not seen”.
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