MARK OLALDE
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South  Africa

A  journey  into  south  Africa's  mines,  the  lives  of  its  miners  and
the  energy-production  industries  fueling  Africa's  rapid  growth

By: Mark Olalde


The  Future  Is...Coal?

9/22/2016

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A coal operation near the town of Arbor, Mpumalanga, sends up huge plumes of dust.
Sharp, sharp!

During my last stint in South Africa, my reporting focused nearly entirely on the gold industry. Gold is shiny, it's worth a lot of money and it makes for a catchy story. I will continue producing work on gold, but on this go round, I'm shifting a large chunk of my focus to a new industry: coal.

Coal is so deeply imbedded in South Africa's psyche (and wallet), that the country's researchers created a phrase specifically for it. The "Minerals Energy Complex" refers to the inexorably connected nature of coal and energy production in South Africa. Below, I include statistics to give some background on the massive extent of the country's coal reliance and production. It becomes clear that this story is at the same time hugely important yet mired in often boring, long-term policy discussions. But while gold has zama zamas, coal has the future of the country's energy production and its impact on climate change.

Further, with new coal mines and power stations continually coming online in this country, why would I focus on it when my work is abandoned mines? Experts agree the only way to meet international emissions standards and other environmental goals is by severely reducing dependence on fossil fuels, especially coal. Therefore, new coal projects will likely have a short lifespan. The term "stranded investment" is coming into play more and more, meaning money put into coal infrastructure that is meant to last for decades could be abandoned because of climate change goals and falling renewables prices. Just like gold, this could stick communities with the bill for social, economic and environmental rehabilitation.
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A coal-fired power plant in Mpumalanga sends dust, smoke and steam into the air.
Here are some stats to put South Africa's coal in perspective:

~According to Eskom -- the parastatal utility company providing nearly all South Africa's electricity -- 77 percent of the country's electricity needs are fueled by coal. According to Eskom: "This is unlikely to change significantly in the next decade, due to the relative lack of suitable alternatives to coal as an energy source." Of course, nearly all objective analysis argues against this stance. In a 2015 report, the country's Department of Energy wrote: "South Africa is fortunate in that, over and above its rich coal resources, it is also well endowed with non- depletable RE sources, notably solar and wind. The country has an average of more than 2,500 hours of sunshine per year and average direct solar radiation levels range between 4.5 and 6.5kWh/m2 per day, placing it in the top-3 in the world."

~According to the U.S. Energy Information Agency, coal is quickly becoming a comparatively expensive form of energy generation, as the price of renewables drop. Removing country-specific tax incentives, coal plants coming online in 2022 in the U.S. will cost less than offshore wind and thermal solar coming online in the same year. However, coal plants will cost 1.64 times more than photovoltaic solar, 2.16 times more than onshore wind and 3.1 times more than geothermal.

​~According to StatsSA -- South Africa's governmental statistics body -- the coal industry accounted for R51 billion (~$3.65 billion) of the country's economy in 2013. This means that the coal segment of the mineral extraction industry is growing while other sectors such as gold are contracting.

~According to the Chamber of Mines -- which represents about 90 percent of South Africa's mineral extraction industry -- South Africa exports the sixth most coal of any nation. In 2014, the country produced an estimated 252.3Mt of coal. More than 27 percent of this was exported, and exported coal was sold at a price more than twice as high as that sold internally.
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Sourced from: StatsSA
I am currently working on the story of a proposed underground coal mine in a highly important and legally protected wetlands area of Mpumalanga. A legal loophole allows mining activities to commence in protected areas if the ministers of both the Department of Mineral Resources and the Department of Environmental Affairs sign off on a specific project. This particular project has the DMR's approval, and activists are afraid that it might soon gain that of the DEA, as well.

But with the environmental impacts of coal, the higher job potential in renewables and the lower cost of new renewables, why the continued investment in coal projects like this one?

That's where my work over the next few months will come into play. Without trying to prove any particular side of the energy production argument, I am looking for the facts: does the entire economy benefit from the coal industry, how much job creation exists and who stands to gain from new coal? More to come.

Cheers,
​Mark
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Sourced from: South Africa's Department of Energy
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A  Toyota  Starlet  in  Malawi

5/29/2016

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Picture
The Nkula A power station's intake pulls water from the Shire River.
Eta,
​“The water comes from God,” 
Chief Chikhawo explains from his scratchy and broken armchair. He is one of several chiefs in Chikhawo Village , a poverty-stricken community just outside the capital of Lilongwe in Malawi.

The chief pauses, then clarifies with a laugh: "It's rainwater." I was interviewing him during a two-week reporting stint in Malawi, where I was chasing a complicated story of the interplay among ambitious irrigation plans, a country reliant on hydropower, and an ancient lake experiencing falling water levels.

Here's the story: Malawi is in the midst of a large-scale irrigation project called the Green Belt Initiative that is guaranteed to have a massive -- potentially good, potentially bad -- impact on the country. Lake levels are already falling, and some scientists predict that drawing more water away from the lake could drop lake levels to a point where the Shire River would dry up. The Shire handles all the lake's outflow, and nearly all of the country's electricity comes from hydropower plants on the river. This conflict is escalating with nutrient loading, a warming lake, fish die-offs, increasingly severe weather events, and food shortages.

I stumbled onto the story by accident while a world away, attending a journalism institute about Lake Superior. During an American scientist's lecture at the conference put on by the (awesome) Institute for Journalism & Natural Resources (IJNR.org), he told a fascinating story about Malawi (sidenote: the open bar had nothing to do with the following decision...). As tends to happen, I figured that South Africa and Malawi are (really not) close enough that I should go to both. So, a few weeks later, I bought a plane ticket to Malawi.

According to World Bank data, Malawi is the world's poorest country. My reporting in Malawi both added credence to that, as well as taught a lesson about why journalists should plan ahead. I landed in the country, alone and unprepared but very much believing the story was an important one. The next two weeks saw me crisscross much of the country in a beat-up, old Toyota Starlet, which needed a lifesaving infusion of air daily in a patched up rear tire. I saw a dusty countryside, often largely stripped of trees; street corners populated with beggars missing limbs; bicycles everywhere as substitutes for cars; billboards imploring the population to halt the rampant murders of people with Albinism; men on the roadside who would hold up a pair of pants all day to sell it for a pittance; and large numbers of ex-pats due to the reliance on them in NGOs, aid organizations, and in some cases even the government.

In February, I published my first piece on the topic with the Oxpeckers Center for Investigative Environmental Journalism (story here: http://oxpeckers.org/2016/02/2450/).

Here are some facts to frame the story:
~~Lake Malawi is millions of years old and is believed to host more fish species -- somewhere around 1,000 -- than any other lake on earth.
~~In December, Lake Malawi reached its lowest recorded surface level since 1997.
~~According to the Department of Irrigation, there are 104,000 hectares already irrigated in the country. The department identifies about four times as much irrigable land (that's about 23 times the land area of Washington, D.C.).
~~The first hydropower plant in line on the Shire River -- Nkula A -- operated at only 60 to 65 percent of its capacity for parts of last year because of low flow on the Shire.
~~Large amounts of foreign money are involved in Malawian aid and infrastructure, including a $350.7 million investment from a U.S. tax-payer funded group called the Millennium Challenge Corporation, for which Congress appropriates money to be given as aid. This particular investment is in energy infrastructure and fixing up parts of Nkula.

When I toured Nkula A and B, I was asked not to take photos inside the power stations, but what I found was a mess. Commissioned in 1966, Nkula A was missing floor and ceiling tiles, its control room was archaic, and a sheet of paper with the words “NOT TO BE OPERATED” scrawled on it covered some controls.
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The children of Chikhawo village peer through the doorway of Chief Chikhawo's home.
(As is evident in this rambling post) I am finding a story such as this one quite difficult to write properly. A complex interplay of variables (irrigation, energy production, climate change), no clear "good guy/outcome" vs. "bad guy/outcome", and the lack of celebrity characters provide unique challenges. In addition, how do I come to a country full of absolute poverty and write a simple "here are the country's environmental concerns" story?

Example 1: Rural Malawians strip the landscape of trees because many people have little or no access to electricity for cooking or warmth. I spoke to Malawians who fully understood the issue of deforestation but said that without a reliable energy sources they had no other choice but to burn wood.

Example 2: Irrigation has obvious environmental consequences for Lake Malawi, but NGOs also say implementing irrigation is the most efficient way to assist rural Malawians.

Example 3: To increase reliability of the country's hydropower, irrigation and near-shore agriculture would have to disappear. So do you choose electricity or agriculture? Food or warmth?

I am still working to untangle this story and publish more articles from my time in Malawi, and I have a feeling that I will be back to continue this work. As always, thanks for taking the time to slog through my work. 

Tiamwere ('Cheers' or 'the drinks are on you' in the Chichewa language),
Mark
Picture
At dusk, a lone fish eagle glides just above the surface of Lake Malawi.
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Zama  Zamas:  South  Africa's  Underground  Black  Market

8/24/2015

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PictureMine entrance that slopes down into an abandoned mine and is used by zama zamas.
Sharp, sharp!

“It’s happening in the Northern Cape already. It’s happening in the Free State. It is happening in Mpumalanga. It is happening in Limpopo. It is happening in the North West, and it is happening in Gauteng, just to our knowledge. In all likelihood it is probably also happening in KwaZulu-Natal," Commissioner Janet Love of the South African Human Rights Commission
 asserted.

Last week, the Commission held a press conference to mark the publication of its investigation into "unregulated artisanal" mining around South Africa. As the commissioner acknowledged, there exist many names for the same issue, that of small-scale illegal mining activities. Their 76-page report outlined numerous facets of this issue: A dearth of academic research, international reach, threats to legal mining and its infrastructure, health and safety concerns, failed mine rehabilitation and much more.

The Commission estimated that between 8,000 and an unknown number north of 30,000 people work in this type of mining in South Africa alone. According to the Department of Health, just shy of 1 million ex-mineworkers live in the country. The "ex" often results from retrenchment or firing, not from choice. In a country with massive unemployment levels (refer to my former post of statistics) -- and with an issue in need of further research, as the Commission pointed out -- it would not be a stretch to imagine many of these former mineworkers returning to abandoned mines to make a living with the skills they possess. Further, a lack of regulation by the government and compliance by companies has led to thousands of abandoned, derelict or ownerless mines around the country, providing the perfect site for these mining activities.

PictureArtisanal miners processing ore in an informal settlement near an illegal mining operation.
As with any unregulated and illegal activity, however, artisanal mining propagates other dangerous variables such as criminal syndicates and violent clashes. In 2010, the government cited a statistic, which said the legal mining sector lost about R6 billion ($455+ million) every year through illegal mining. A factsheet published this year by the Chamber of Mines estimated that between 5-10 percent of annual gold mining is stolen product.

At the same time, stereotypes pervade the myth of zama zamas. They are believed to be all foreigners working illegally (in a country where all tuk shop owners are Pakistani, all criminals are Nigerian, all Zimbabweans are taking jobs, etc.....). Sordid details from the world of zama zamas -- family's living underground with the workers, the handling of mercury in the processing of ore, the cave-ins -- find their way into newspapers and serve to continue this dialogue.

Yet, there are those pushing for reforms to fix this system. As the Commission cited in its report, one potential solution is slowly bringing zama zamas into the realm of legality. Some researchers and politicians are championing this effort that would give illegal miners assistance in applying for permits to mine. The Commission even suggested turning over abandoned mines that are under the supervision of the government to these miners. 


A cooperative approach among mining companies, government departments, community groups and artisanal miners is undoubtedly needed to fully address this black market-industry, but any real solution continues to evade all interested parties.
Cheers,
Mark

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The  Necessary  Environment

8/16/2015

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Map of mines around Johannesburg in the provinces of Gauteng, Mpumalanga, Free State and North West. -- data from the South African Mineral Deposits Database. Johannesburg was built on mining, and indeed a massive gold (Au) reef cuts through the region.
Sharp, sharp!

I am reporting from the mines that are currently abandoned, derelict and ownerless, but there is a much broader context explaining why this situation arose. The few interviews I have conducted with illegal miners so far illuminated this. They work to send remittance; they work because unemployment is rampant in South Africa yet astronomical in their home countries; or they work to pay for their children's schooling. It is evident that a specific environment is necessary to foster such a black market.

Their existence and that of other less-than-legal behavior brings crime, HIV/AIDS, substance abuse, prostitution and numerous related issues. However, the act of arresting someone for a criminal behavior does little good -- if not some bad -- when broader issues are not addressed. To give my readers the beginning of that necessary context, I have listed 11 important statistics concerning life in South Africa. I included minimal editorializing to aid understanding of the numbers while allowing you to draw your own conclusions. Read on to learn more, and be on the lookout in the coming weeks for more information on the process of illegal mining, the legal issues of addressing it and much more.

Cheers,
Mark
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Letters precariously hang onto the Baragwanath Transport Interchange and Traders Market, or simply, Bara. An important site in Soweto, it is maintained to what seems a specific level of disrepair.
24.3 percent -- Stated unemployment rate, reported by the government for 2014 Q4. However, 43 percent of the potential labor force, the population aged 15-64, is not seeking work. Unemployment in South Africa is the highest it has been in the past decade.

53.6 percent -- Youth unemployment, defined as 15-24-year-olds, in 2013, according to the World Bank.

Nearly 90 percent -- Amount of the country's electricity generated by coal-fired plants, according to the country's Department of Energy. According to the CIA, that number rises slightly above 90 percent with the addition of other fossil fuels. South Africa remains one of the world's largest coal producers, but much of the highest grade coal is exported, leaving power outages due to "load shedding."

8 percent -- The amount of the GDP from mining in 2015 Q1, according to government statistics. An additional unknown yet large percent of mining and quarrying comes illegally through "artisanal mining."

62.15 percent -- Percent of the vote won by the African National Congress, Nelson Mandela's party, in the 2014 national elections, according to the Electoral Commission of South Africa. Its rivals, the Democratic Alliance, received 22.23 percent, and the ANC-breakaway Economic Freedom Fighters won 6.35 percent. Another 10 parties earned enough votes to hold at least one seat in the National Assembly.

80.2 percent -- The percent of South African citizens classified who are "black," according to South African government statistics. Then, 8.8 percent are "coloured," 8.4 percent are "white" and 2.5 percent are "Indian/Asian." Race classifications still retain legacies of Apartheid.

57 years -- The life expectancy in South Africa as of 2013, according to the World Bank. This comes as a sharp contrast to 1995, the year after Democracy, when life expectancy was 61. In the mid-noughts, this dropped to 52 years, in large part due to HIV/AIDS and former president Thabo Mbeki's slow response to the disease as he questioned the links between the HIV virus and AIDS.

About 6.2 million -- The estimated number of adults living with HIV/AIDS in South Africa in 2013, according to the CIA. South Africa has more people living with the disease than any other country in the world. That is roughly 1 in 5 South African adults. Additionally, the President's Emergency Fund for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), a successful HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment program pioneered by President George W. Bush, was meant to run out in 2008 and is being phased out currently.

10 percent -- The drop in percentage points of enrollment rates between primary and secondary education, according to the Department of Basic Education. About 99 percent of eligible-aged students are enrolled in primary school, but that number drops to about 89 percent for secondary education.
 
1.9 percent -- GDP growth in 2013, according to the World Bank. The economy contracted following the 2008 global market collapse, and projections show growth hovering at merely 2 percent over the next several years. South Africa holds the second largest economy in Africa after Nigeria, although measured per capita, South Africa is still solidly on top of the rankings.

4.5 percent -- The GDP growth in 2014 (4.2 percent in 2013) of sub-Saharan Africa, according to the World Bank. Africa hosts some of the world's faster growing economies, and while South Africa is looked to as one of the continent's economic leaders, it has lagged behind in recent years.
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Nelson Mandela's prison cell on Robben Island. Upon his release in 1990, he addressed a crowd of an estimated 100,000 people in Cape Town. "It is only through disciplined mass action that our victory can be assured," Mandela said.
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    Mark Olalde

    I was a freelance journalist, previously based in South Africa, where I reported on the related industries of mining and energy production.

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