Thursday, April ten, 2008

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I'm Shannon O'Donnell.

Making headlines today:

Transport Minister Jeff Radebe on Wednesday asserted that the first phase of the Gautrain rapid-rail project would be completed before South Africa hosts the soccer World Cup, as well as on budget.

Bombela, the consortium building the project, has been contracted to complete the first phase of the 80-km project in 45 months, which makes the completion date July 2010, by when the World Cup would be over.

However, Radebe told reporters in Pretoria that the contract had been signed for the project to be ready to ride by early June 2010.

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Precious metals consultancy GFMS, which earlier this year correctly predicted that the price of gold would rise above the one thousand dollars an ounce mark before Christmas, expects that the yellow metal will continue to rally at least until early 2009, research director Neal Meader said in Toronto on Wednesday.

Presenting the findings of the group's Gold Survey 2008, Meader said that the price of gold would likely reach a peak, perhaps around one thousand one hundred dollars an ounce, either in the last quarter of this year or in the first half of 2009.

However, he pointed out that the subsequent correction, which GFMS expects will take the price to levels around six hundred dollars an ounce in the longer term, represented a shift from previous forecasts.

Decentralised power, built closer to the demand rather than the power source, could help "bridge the gap" at a time of a power crisis, Group Five Energy MD Willie Zeelie said.

Speaking at a media briefing on Wednesday, he said that, although decentralised power was built at a higher cost than base load power, it was something that had been happening on the African continent for a while, although not much in South Africa.

Group Five, which has been involved with so called ‘captive power plant' projects throughout Africa, believed there were "big opportunities" in South Africa for these smaller captive power plants, and could provide a potential solution to ensure that South Africa does not have to turn away large industry or investors.

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Also making headlines:

Eskom signs deal for additional Mozambique power, and eyes more
Sasol announces global synthetic jet-fuel breakthrough
Sub-Saharan African growth remains robust, but global forecast is slashed
BHP says it not aware of China buying a substantial stake in the company
Mining firms hope for Zimbabwe gold rush
And, Zambia to boost power output for copper demand

In political news:

Regional concern grows over Zimbabwe
Bush urges China to open talks with the Dalai Lama
A bomb attack on a NATO convoy leaves eight Afghans dead
And, a US envoy sees a Kenya coalition deal soon

That's a round up of news making headlines today. For more on these and other stories, visit engineeringnews.co.za, miningweekly.com and polity.org.za