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SA GHG emissions twice global average, says WWF-SA

15th March 2013

By: Anine Kilian

Contributing Editor Online

  

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South Africa’s reliance on coal-fired power has a negative effect on the country’s environment and ecosystems, as it is responsible for most greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions in the country, says World Wildlife Fund South Africa (WWF-SA) senior manager of freshwater programmes Christine Colvin.

She says that South Africa’s GHG emissions are twice the global average per capita, owing to coal plants.

“Currently, South Africa is above the global average with regard to GHG emissions. In the Integrated Resources Development Plan, South Africa has committed to lowering these emissions and developing 40% renewable energy in the new infrastructure created by 2030,” Colvin states.

She states that South Africa is experi- encing acid rain that is linked with the carbon dioxide emissions from coal-fired power plants, which are distributed in an atmospheric plume around coal plants.

“Coal also has a high level of mercury, which is distributed terrestrially and aqua-tically and which will eventually reach our food chain.

“Another impact of coal-fired plants, with national repercussions, is acid mine drainage (AMD) from coal mines. South Africa is aware of AMD from the gold mines in the Witwatersrand basin, but we also have a long history of AMD from coal mines and the ore rock associated with coal,” says Colvin.

She continues by stating that, once the sulphide in the ore rock is exposed to water, it produces sulphuric acid that reduces the potential hydrogen (pH) balance of the water.

“In the Olifants river catchment, in Mpumalanga, where coal mining has been taking place for more than 100 years, there are rivers and streams with a pH balance as low as 2.7, which means it is like acetone.

“It is not just the acidity that causes a problem. Once there is water that is no longer buffered, it means that all the metals that are held in solids are more easily dissolved into solution.

“This renders the metals bio-available, resulting in high levels of toxicity when in comes into contact with fauna and flora,” she explains.

Colvin notes that most long-term and significant damage by coal-fired plants is evident in the Olifants river catchment area.

“WWF-SA produced a coal-water futures report in 2011, which summarised the levels of pollution in the Olifants river’s catchment area and compared them with an area in the high grasslands, which we have been working on for a while.

“The high grasslands, on the border of KwaZulu-Natal, the Free State and Mpumalanga, on the edge of the escarpment, is a relatively pristine area. It is also the head-waters of the Tugela, Pongola and Vaal river systems,” she adds.

Colvin states that it is a critical water-source area, but that it is increasingly being subjected to applications for prospecting licences for coal mining.

“We are specifically focusing on this area because we have seen the effects coal has on other areas and we feel that South Africa is not in a position to compromise its water supply for short-term gain, for a fossil fuel that is in the process of being eliminated from our energy mix,” she notes.

Colvin points out that prospecting licences have also been issued around Wakkerstroom, a remote high grassland area, with a large wetland centre for migratory birds.

“There are now applications to convert prospecting licences to mining licences. During the country’s period of transition from having a high carbon footprint to having a low carbon footprint, we should ensure that our natural capital and ecological infrastructure, which are our life-support system in these headwater areas, are protected and not exposed to coal mining.

“We say that because South Africa does not have a good record in terms of cleaning up mines once the profiteering has finished. South Africa has a
R2-billion bill for Phase 1 of AMD in the Witwatersrand basin and the Auditor- General has estimated that the 6 000 aban-doned mines in the country are going to cost tax payers R30-billion to clean up,” Colvin explains.

She further states that, in these high water-yield areas, the water liabilities and costs of having to run AMD treatment plants and reverse osmosis plants do not make coal mining in these areas viable.

“We should protect our natural capital in those water-provisioning areas to provide water security for future generations.

“The problem is that, currently, every min-ing licence and every prospecting licence is evaluated on a piecemeal basis; individually, each licence is not causing enough harm to stop coal mining from going ahead. “However, if a strategic and spatially explicit view of the development trajectory is taken into consideration, it would be easier to demarcate high water-yield areas to be left alone,” Colvin states.

South Africa should have more coal in the ground than out of the ground if the country wants to protect itself from climate change and global warming, she continues.

“If we are going to leave coal in the ground in some places, it should be left intact in the areas that are most vulnerable to AMD,” Colvin says.

Meanwhile, there are many dispersed rural communities in the grassland areas that rely on natural springs, shallow boreholes and natural streams and rivers.

“We are seeing a high daily subsistence cost paid by the rural poor in these areas.

“There are a few abandoned coal mines in these areas that have been discharging AMD, which, in turn, are affecting the rivers and streams in that area.

“It is interesting to note that when the rural community passes the local streams their cattle won’t drink the water. “This has taught local residents that they need to walk further to get freshwater that is not downstream of an abandoned coal mine shaft,” she explains.

Colvin says that it adds to the daily burden of their lives in terms of meeting their own basic needs in unserviced communities, as these communities have relied for generations on natural goods and services provided by the landscape.

“There is a high human cost involved for women and children, who have to look after the household’s water needs. “They are taking evasive action, but it is costing them in terms of labour and energy,” she says.

Colvin adds that in areas affected by AMD some farmers have seen a 40% decrease in the agricultural yield of maize.

“From a food security perspective, there are serious considerations nationally because this is where the water for KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng comes from.

“Even State-owned power utility Eskom, which relies on the Vaal system being cleaned up by interbasin transfers from the Tugela river, has said that its power plants downstream of this area cannot tolerate the pollution that could be caused by coal mining in the area,” she concludes.

Edited by Megan van Wyngaardt
Creamer Media Contributing Editor Online

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