The Sunday Mail
Ishemunyoro Chingwere
African governments have committed themselves to expedite coal beneficiation strategies and convert the resource to other facets of their economies as the deadline for total ban of the use of coal in thermal power generation nears.
The plan was revealed by Mines and Mining Development Deputy Minister Polite Kambamura, who led the Zimbabwean delegation to this year’s edition of the Africa Mining Summit that was held in Botswana. The decision comes in the wake of a 2015 pledge by world leaders, under what is now known as the Paris Agreement, which seeks to keep global warming since pre-industrial times to 1, 5 degrees Celsius and scientist have noted that this can only be achieved through banning of coal that is the largest polluting fossil fuel.
The agreement gives developed countries a deadline of 2030 to stop the use of coal for electricity generation, while the developing world has up to 2050 to find other energy sources.
The ban threatens the future of coal mining industry in Zimbabwe given that most of the companies (Hwange Colliery, Makomo Resources, Zambezi Gas)’s major customer is Zesa and there appears to be little investment in alternative use of coal such as diesel and coalbed methane gas extraction.
Deputy Minister Kambamura said African mining sector leaders who attended the Africa Mining Summit had committed to mitigate effects of an impending ban.
“The other area of discussion was on energy – the energy generation mix of the future given that the energy minerals that we have in Africa like coal (and) uranium on what role they will play in the future versus renewable sources of energy,” said the Deputy Minister.
“Coal is the main source of base load energy, the future of coal in Africa – as you may be aware of the 2015 Paris Agreement that seeks to ban its use, is under threat. This is against the background that in Africa and in Zimbabwe in particular, we have a large coal resource that remains unexploited.
“There was an agreement that we go the direction of mining our coal and beneficiate, mine coalbed methane gas, value add it to fuel, coalter, fertiliser, export coking coal and when we get the money we invest it in renewable forms of energy so that by 2050 or years beyond we won’t be affected,” he said.
Zimbabwe this year launched a National Renewable Energy Policy (NREP) which recognises that an upper middle income economy of 2030 as expounded by President Mnangagwa “needs to be driven by clean, sustainable energy sources.”
The policy also highlights the need to address “. . . issues of Climate Change, (and) focuses on driving cost-effective implementation of sustainable energy sources, social upliftment through community involvement, gender equality and employment generation as laid out in other various Government Acts and Policies.”
