Every Friday, SAfm’s radio anchor Sakina Kamwendo speaks to Martin Creamer, publishing editor of Engineering News & Mining Weekly. Reported here is this Friday’s At the Coalface transcript:

Kamwendo: China is engaging with Africa to advance clean energy, this week’s London Indaba was told.

Creamer: Amazing insight into China’s mutually benefiting embrace of Africa was spelt out very well at the London Indaba, which is organised by South Africans. The China-Africa insight provided there was really remarkable. We got this vision of China wanting to collaborate intensively with Africa in new trade through a massive outreach called the Hunan model. Now, Hunan is a province in China. It is a great province. It is a province almost like the Nile Basin.

It has got great agriculture, it solved China's agricultural problems. It is now going heavily into green energy. We heard at the London Indaba that you just see solar panels everywhere, because China doesn't want to be committed to having to import oil and gas. It wants to generate clean, green energy from the sun and the wind and it is doing just that exponentially. China is going all out to collaborate with the countries in Africa that were liberated, the liberation movement countries including South Africa. We know that in the Hunan province there is the big company called Sany.

Now, if you travel out to the East Rand in Gauteng on the freeway you will see Sany on the left hand side in South Africa. It is a big industrial equipment company and this is a base for it, not only to operate in South Africa, but the whole of Southern Africa. Then, BYD, this new car manufacturer, the green car manufacturer, that is also in the Hunan province. The excitement around this was intense, because there is also in Tanzania TVET colleges being set up by the Chinese to educate Africa into the new green energy transition.

Kamwendo: Malawi is receiving strong global applause for opening up its geological survey data for the whole world to see.

Creamer: Well these days, it was clear from that London Indaba as well, that if a country does not open up its national geological survey data, that country will not get investment in mining. There was a plea made by Mark Cutifani, he was speaking there, he is the former AngloGold Ashanti and former Anglo American CEO who operated from Johannesburg here and is very close to Africa.

He made a plea that all countries in Africa should open up their geological survey data to the world. He said it is not only that it is going to happen in Africa, it is going to happen everywhere. There is a whole new surge in mining now and the companies are looking at what a country has got and if you can show them clearly what you’ve got, that is the first step in their big investment possibilities into your country. I think South Africa should take note.

Kamwendo: Richards Bay Minerals has arranged for 80% of the electricity it needs to come from the sun and the wind.

Creamer: It is remarkable how strongly certain mining companies have advanced to make sure that they go clean and green on the energy front. Richards Bay Minerals is part of Rio Tinto, which is an international group, which is committed to decarbonisation. They have to move very fast because, we are coal energy based here. These companies, like Richards Bay Minerals, export their mineral sands concentrates. Those mineral sands go into just about every modern product from paints to smartphones. If they are clean and green, they earn a better price.

If they are not, they can pay penalties. They have got to move very, very fast, which is what Richards Bay Minerals  is succeeded in doing. It has concluded three big power packs and it is remarkable how quickly they will have 80% of the energy that they consume being clean and green. The first big project comes on stream this year, in the fourth quarter. The second is the second quarter of 2026 next year, and then the third is in 2027. You see that in a very short time they will have 80% of their energy needs covered. They talk about the wheeling system in South Africa working very well.

That is the way you get your green energy credits along the transmission lines. All in all, it seems that happens at a much lower cost. They are getting cost benefits from doing this themselves and these independent power producers are supplying them through power purchase agreements that have been set in place for the mining operation in KwaZulu-Natal immensely in a relatively short period of time.

Kamwendo: Thanks very much. Martin Creamer is publishing, editor of Engineering News & Mining Weekly.