Fairly far down the list of ideas hitherto considered to be self-evident is that if regulators fail to regulate then there are no regulations.
The decision of the forestry, fisheries & environment minister to uphold Sasol’s appeal lodged in 2023 against the government’s decision to reject its proposed approach to pollution measurement at its Secunda plant is ostensibly practical. Without such an agreement Sasol will suffer enormous damage, which itself will create havoc in markets, for the fiscus and for shareholders.
The panel that has advised the minister on the Sasol matter has already submitted its report — not yet announced — on a similar issue at Eskom regarding a slew of its filthy and noncompliant coal-fired power stations. Without an exemption from minimum emissions standards, Eskom will be forced to immediately switch off 16GW of capacity, and it is hard to imagine the minister opting for that.
That Sasol and Eskom have managed to manoeuvre themselves into such a zero-sum position that a minister is asked — in the short term, at least — to choose between economic carnage or environmental harm and pollution-related sickness and death, is a bitter pill.
Both Eskom and Sasol will need to take advantage of any window they have been given to clean up and modernise their operations. The SA government may have failed dismally to regulate polluters, but as the vice of carbon border taxes tightens over the coming years, their customers will find themselves in a dichotomy of their own. They will need to dump their dirty energy suppliers or lose their customers.
They, too, will probably feel that this is an uncomplicated decision.
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