In response to Zambia's recent declaration of a national emergency owing to a severe drought affecting power generation, copper miner First Quantum Minerals is taking measures to ensure the continuity of its operations. Power utility Zesco has introduced daily eight-hour loadshedding for its retail customers and initiated consultations with mining companies to reduce power supply to the sector by 150 MW from May 1 to December 31. First Quantum’s operations are expected to have power curtailed by about 80 MW over this period.

With some of the most prominent and respected figures in the international energy sphere among the 24 speakers and panelists and more than 500 delegates at the Annual conference of the African Refiners and Distributors Association (ARDA) in Cape Town this week, among the biggest concerns is: how does Africa’s energy security survive along the road to Energy Transition? ARDA Executive Secretary, Anibor Kragha says that the continent’s energy security cannot be sacrificed to meet a fast-track global agenda for phasing out of fossil fuels in order to bring the international levels of emissions within the standards demanded.

Local developer and operator of clean energy infrastructure, Blue Energy Africa, has signed a 20-year deal with Borbet South Africa (SA) for the procurement of power from renewable-energy sources. Founded in 1962 by Peter Wilhelm Borbet, the family-owned company has five locations in Germany, as well as one each in Austria and South Africa, with the latter in Gqeberha.

Amid the compounding effects of loadshedding in South Africa and increasing concerns about climate change, appliance manufacturer Defy has launched its Solar Off-Grid fridge and freezer range to address local energy challenges. Sabrina Jardim tells us more.

In this article, residential solar solutions provider GoSolr CEO and co-founder Andrew Middleton, writes that solar power has the potential to significantly reduce loadshedding, but patchwork policies, differing tariffs and a lack of incentives are stalling growth.

French multinational energy group TotalEnergies was committed to the energy transition and has a strategy for this, highlighted the group’s MD and CEO marketing and services and country chair and executive VP: Southern Africa Mariam Kane-Garcia on Tuesday. She was addressing a session of the African Refiners and Distributors Association 2024 conference, in Cape Town. The TotalEnergies transition strategy had two pillars, she pointed out. The first was ‘more energy, less emissions’, with fossil fuels. “We are not giving away our core business, which is oil and gas,” she noted. The second was the development of its low-carbon ‘Integrated Power’ business, which involved the deployment of renewable energy.

The Gauteng Provincial Government (GPG) has installed and commissioned a combined equivalent of six independent microgrid power plants through the installation of rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) and battery storage at 27 prioritised health institutions across the province. The total combined capacity of these solar installations amounts to 6.3 MWh, while the combined battery storage component adds up to a total of 15.6 MWh. These have been installed at 11 public hospitals, nine primary health care clinics, and eight community healthcare centres throughout the province. A twenty-eighth facility will be integrated next month.

Independent power company Globeleq has completed the acquisition of a 48.3% equity stake in the 25 MW Winnergy solar photovoltaic (PV) plant in Egypt from Enerray, Enerray Global Solar Opportunities and Desert Technologies. The plant, which is in operation, is located within Egypt’s flagship Benban Solar complex, near Aswan, and is adjacent to Globeleq’s 66 MW ARC solar plant.

Africa's mid- and downstream oil products supply infrastructure is ageing and suffers from a lack of investment, outdated policy frameworks and insufficiencies in regional, national and urban energy planning when compared with other regions across the world. Efforts have also not kept pace with rapidly growing populations and urbanisation trends, which has resulted in fragmented supply routes, bottlenecks and insufficient infrastructure capacity, contributing to an overreliance on trucks, congestion in cities and ports, and disrupted access to energy.

Flourishing activity in the electric vehicle, power infrastructure, AI and automation sectors will lead to at least 10-million metric tons of additional copper consumption over the next decade, commodity trader Trafigura told Reuters. Technological developments such as artificial intelligence and automation, and the energy transition, which includes electric vehicles and renewable energy, have already driven up demand prospects for copper cable used to conduct electricity.