The Sunday Mail
Oliver Kazunga
Senior Business Reporter
SIX investors that were licensed by the Government to explore coal-bed methane (CBM) gas in Matabeleland North province are at different stages of implementing their projects.
In 2020, the Government issued special grants to six investors that include Tumagole of South Africa; Sakunda Energy; and Shangani Energy Exploration (SEE), which is owned by Sinosteel, a Chinese steel giant, to explore and tap into cleaner fuel for electricity generation in Lupane, Gwayi, and Hwange. Climate advocates view the development of methane gas as critical in efforts to curb climate change.
In an interview last week, Mines and Mining Development Deputy Minister Polite Kambamura said the investors were at different stages of implementing their projects, undertaking activities such as feasibility studies, aero-magnetic surveys and resource mobilisation.
Zimbabwe has been touted to have huge deposits of untapped CBM, predominantly in Matabeleland North province, covering Hwange, Lupane and Gwayi areas.
However, their commercial viability has not yet been supported by geological information. Tumagole has indicated that it would invest as much as R55 billion in extracting methane gas in Zimbabwe while SEE has earmarked US$780 million to build a 600MW power station and petrochemical-related industries.
Mines and Mining Development Portfolio Committee chairman Edmund Mkratigwa said over the years, Zimbabwe has seen some drilling and desorption tests being conducted with positive confirmatory results of the CBM.
He said the projects have, however, failed to materialise largely due to funding constraints.
“The investors, after undertaking feasibility studies, will be in fully fledged development stages. Such investments in coal-bed methane are characterised by serious exploration and in terms of capital outlay, it’s quite intensive. So, our approach is to give them ample time to organise themselves through their preparations and go into full project development stage and possibly that project will see the light of the day. In the past, other investors, including Chinese, have gone into the area and tried to do some exploration and those projects did not see the light of the day,” he said.
For instance, in 2015, China Africa Sunlight Energy was reported to be awaiting the conclusion of financial closure to start major infrastructural development at its US$2,1 billion project in the Gwayi area.
However, the project, which was a joint venture between Zimbabwe’s Old Stone Investments and Shandong Taishan Sunlight of China, was proposed for the development of a 600MW power station, a coal mine and a coal-bed methane gas extraction venture but has not materialised.
In a separate interview, economist Ms Wendy Mpofu said tapping into the coal-bed methane gas was critical for Zimbabwe, not only in terms of the gas being a cleaner fuel for electricity generation, but also to bolster the country’s energy requirements in line with the industrialisation agenda the Second Republic has adopted.
The Government envisages an upper middle-income society by 2030 and this is bolstered by the industrialisation agenda across all economic sectors, including mining, manufacturing and agriculture.
Under Vision 2030, the country’s electricity demand is expected to surge to about 11 000MW from the existing 2 200MW.
“The Government, in 2019, launched the mining strategy roadmap to propel the mining sector to a US$12 billion mining industry by 2023 and this, coupled with the national industrialisation agenda, means that Zimbabwe’s energy demand will rise significantly. Given such a background as we move towards the attainment of an upper middle income economy, it means that we need to tap into the coal-bed methane sector, not only because it’s a cleaner source of fuel for electricity, but to support the economic activity in the country by ensuring that there is sufficient power,” she said.
As part of efforts to bolster power generation, the Government, through the Zimbabwe Energy Regulatory Authority, has since 2010 licensed over 100 independent power producers (IPPs) to invest in power projects.
The projects by IPPs were also at different stages of implementation, with some already feeding into the national grid.
For instance, the US$10 million thermal power station, a joint venture coal-fired power station being built in phases by Qualisave Mineral Resources of Zimbabwe and Yuxia ZhongXin Coking Company of China, was already feeding 50MW into the national grid. Construction of the first phase of the 300MW thermal power plant in Hwange under the joint venture arrangement began in February 2019 and was expected to produce 50MW in October 2020 but missed the deadline on account of the Covid-19 pandemic.
