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When a social media site throws out an advert for a product you were just discussing over the phone, it’s easy to jump to the conclusion that ‘they’ must be listening, says Aura CEO and co-founder Warren Myers.

The truth, however, is that the site employed artificial intelligence (AI) to predict your behaviour.

“You searched for a yeast starter last week and commented on a friend’s photo of sourdough bread yesterday. The ad for a bread-making course that seemingly pops up out of the blue was shown to you because the data predicted you might be interested in it, based on your own and previous users’ behaviour,” notes Myers.

“Those same principles can be applied to fight crime – and soon will.”

Aura is a security and medical response marketplace, gathering and centralising data from more than 170 private security companies before applying AI to dispatch the closest vetted response vehicle to its more than 500 000 active users.

There is a wealth of information to predict the likelihood of crime, says Myers.

“The data exists to predict, and thus prevent, crime, but it’s just not being analysed as yet.”

However, when it comes to predicting crime, it’s not quite as simple as scraping social media to find people who did successive searches for ‘crowbar’ and ‘balaclava’.

Data of use here spans from the obvious indicators, such as a person’s presence in a bad part of town, to the more surprising, which includes weather patterns and the days of the week.

A Finnish study, for example, showed that a 1 °C increase in temperature results in a 1.7% increase in criminal activity, based on two decades’ worth of data.

Another study in the US proved that vehicle theft spikes on weekends and in the evenings, notes Myers.

Also, science has even shown that when a local football team loses unexpectedly, domestic violence incidents increase by 10%.

By collating all this data, as well as past crime statistics, information from tipping lines, social media scraping, CCTV, and more, crime can be predicted, and emergency services proactively dispatched before it is too late, says Myers.

The same principle can also be used to predict spikes in traffic accidents and to dispatch emergency services to nearby locations for even faster response times.

The AI employed here is similar to Uber’s algorithms which predict when and where there will be a high probability of ride requests, so the service provider can dispatch drivers proactively.

Again, the same principle can also be applied to riots, adds Myers.

“Riots, like the ones parts of South Africa was subjected to recently, are one of the most difficult emergency incidents to manage because they have such a staggering snowball effect.

“History has shown that once a riot escalates past a certain point, almost nothing can be done that won’t be to the detriment of everyone involved. By predicting it, it can be prevented or contained in the early stages.”

Using AI Proactively

Emergency services, from ambulances to private security and police, currently largely operate on a reactive basis, explains Myers.

“A call comes in, and a vehicle is dispatched to assist. As the country’s crime and emergency statistics keep increasing, it’s clear that a proactive approach is the answer.”

This will happen soon – predictability fuelled by AI and big data can reduce violent crimes by 25% as early as 2023, believes Myers.

“It is unclear how accurate our predictability will be within this timeframe, but we have pegged a really high expectation.

“We are aiming for crime and risk prediction to be the primary creator of real dispatches on the Aura platform – in other words, we want to be responding more to predictions than to actual panics. Once a person has panicked, the crime/damage has usually been done.”

Data engineers at Aura are already working on expanding its existing security and medical response algorithms to become the centre repository for risk data, says Myers.

There will be a number of data pools which will feed into...

A request for information (RFI) has been issued to assess the implementation options and market appetite for the creation of a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import hub at the Port of Ngqura, in the Eastern Cape.

The RFI is designed as an information gathering exercise to inform a future procurement programme and a deadline of 12:00 on December 3 has been set for responses.

The document has been issued by the Central Energy Fund, which has established a joint development agreement (JDA) with fellow State-owned enterprises Transnet and the Coega Development Corporation to facilitate such a terminal at the port and the adjacent Coega Special Economic Zone.

The RFI is seeking market input on three components, namely:

gas aggregation, whereby LNG demand is consolidated across a number of customers to ensure cost-effective supply that matches demand;

the engineering, procurement and construction of the fixed gas infrastructure linking the port to offtakers; and

the provision of a floating storage and regasification unit and terminal operator services.

Respondents can either make submissions on each component separately, or submit a “bundled” response covering all three elements.

Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe announced in 2019 that government envisaged Coega as the initial hub for the importation of LNG, with Richards Bay and Saldanha Bay as possible future locations.

This, despite arguments that Richards Bay should be the front-runner, owing to the fact that most of the country’s gas demand is located on the east coast and indications that planning for an LNG terminal at Matola, in Mozambique, was at an advanced stage.

The Department of Mineral Resources and Energy has also indicated that bidding for the 3 000 MW gas-to-power independent power producer (IPP) programme catered for in the Integrated Resources Plan of 2019 could be launched before the end of February 2022. It is anticipated that at least 1 000 MW will be allocated to the Port of Ngqura.

Besides demand that could arise from the IPP programme, the RFI document notes that the Coega precinct also has the following potential inception gas demand:

the 340 MW Dedisa diesel peaking plant, which is currently operating at a 12% capacity factor but which could be reviewed if gas were to become available;

the 200 MW Mulilo-Total mid-merit plant being procured through the delayed Risk Mitigation Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (RMIPPPP);

a 450 MW Karpowership mid-merit plant which is also a preferred bidder under the RMIPPPP, but which does not yet have environmental authorisation and is the subject of a legal challenge;

current industrial demand in the area of 5 PJ a year; and

the prospect for converting heavy fuel oil bunkering demand, which peaked at 1-million tons a year pre-Covid, to cleaner fuels.

The document states that a nonmandatory virtual briefing will be held at 10:00 on November 17 and that respondents have until November 24 to request clarification on any item contained in the RFI.

The Namibian government has stolen a hydrogen march on its larger neighbour South Africa announcing at COP26 the selection of HYPHEN Hydrogen Energy as the preferred bidder for a $9.4-billion green hydrogen project to be developed in the Tsau //Khaeb National Park, near the coastal town of Luderitz, in southern Namibia.

HYPHEN is a joint venture between Nicholas Holdings Limited, a strategic investment and infrastructure project developer, and ENERTRAG South Africa, a unit of an independent German energy company that has a portfolio of renewable energy projects and which has also been producing green hydrogen since 2011.

Following a competitive tender process, Namibia announced that HYPHEN had been selected as the preferred bidder to build a vertically integrated project able to produce 300 000 t/y of green hydrogen and green ammonia for export into regional and global markets from 2026 onwards.

Once the feasibility study is concluded and the project reaches financial close, HYPHEN will have the right to construct and operate the project for a 40-year period.

Speaking during an event hosted at the COP26 Commonwealth Pavilion on November 4, Presidential Economic Advisor James Mnyupe said the project was closely aligned with the Namibian government’s vision for green hydrogen and for the Karas region, in southern Namibia.

Mnyupe said that, while a large focus would be on exporting to Europe, there was also potential to sell some of the output to neighbouring countries, to “take advantage of the vision that our leaders have for the African Continental Free Trade Area”.

“A lot of our neighbours have been contacting us – Angola, South Africa and Botswana – to ask how this project can be integrated into the Southern African Power Pool,” he reported.

HYPHEN CEO Marco Raffinetti said that the first $4.4-billion phase of the project would involve the building of 2 GW of renewable-electricity generation capacity, as well as the electrolyser capacity to produce green hydrogen for conversion into green ammonia.

The project will use desalinated water, part of which will be supplied to communities in nearby Luderitz.

Further expansion phases in the late 2020s would raise the total investment value to $9.4-billion, which was almost in line with Namibia’s current gross domestic product.

Once complete the integrated facility would have a renewables generation capacity of 5 GW and electrolyser capacity of 3 GW, with surplus electricity capacity to be fed into the Namibian grid and potentially into the regional power pool.

“The Tsau //Khaeb National Park is among the top five locations in the world for low-cost hydrogen production, benefiting from a combination of co-located onshore wind and solar resources near the sea and land export routes to market,” Raffinetti said.

HYPHEN director Dr Tobias Bischof-Niemz, who is also ENERTRAG South Africa CEO, described the investment as a “milestone” in Namibia’s ambition to be a leading international producer of green hydrogen.

This ambition, Bischof-Niemz added, would not only facilitate the full decarbonisation of the Namibian economy but support the decarbonisation efforts of other countries, which were turning their attention to the hard-to-abate sectors of marine and land freight, steel, chemicals, fertilisers and cement.

The project would create 15 000 direct jobs over the four-year construction period, as well as 3 000 permanent direct jobs over the 40-year operational period.

It was also viewed as a pioneer project in a far larger green hydrogen pushed being driven by Namibian President Hage Geingob and the Namibian Investment Promotion and Development Board, which indicated planning was under way for yet more competitive green-hydrogen tenders.

“This is exactly the type of investment the board aims to attract as it is directly aligned to our mandate of unlocking investment opportunities that drive the economy forward, and most importantly, improve the quality of life for all Namibians,” Namib...

Creamer Media's Chanel de Bruyn speaks to Engineering News Editor Terence Creamer about the latest energy sector developments, including load-shedding, new procurements, a climate-finance announcement and the creation of a new energy council.

Volkswagen Group South Africa (VWSA) has taken the next step in its electric mobility strategy, which kicked off in 2020 with the launch of an electric-Golf test fleet.

The e-Golfs were used for research purposes and testing by motoring media, as well as Volkswagen dealers in an effort to gain insights into the experiences of living with an electric vehicle (EV) in South Africa.

“It is important for us to conduct thorough research on EVs before introducing them in South Africa,” says VWSA passenger car brand head Steffen Knapp.

“With the e-Golf test fleet, we exposed hundreds of Volkswagen customers to EVs and over 90% of those customers indicated that they would consider buying an EV in future.

“This year, we also brought in a fleet of Volkswagen ID.3 vehicles, which were used for experiential events for corporate clients, dealers, as well as motoring media,” adds Knapp.

The ID brand refers to Volkswagen’s new-energy-vehicle vehicles.

The ID.3 is a five-door hatchback.

The second phase of Volkswagen’s electromobility strategy in South Africa will see the introduction of an all-electric ID.4 test fleet next year.

The ID.4 is the crossover sibling of the ID.3. It offers ranges of up to 522 km.

“Most South African drivers currently prefer internal combustion engine cars,” notes Knapp.

“In order to be South Africa’s best-selling EV brand, we first need to educate our consumers by getting as many of them as possible to experience electric vehicles with the hope of changing perceptions.

“The introduction of the all-electric and best-selling ID.4 will assist us with gaining valuable insights, which will pave the way for Volkswagen to include EVs in the future product portfolio in South Africa.”

The ID.4, which is the current World Car of the Year, is the Volkswagen group’s best-selling electric model.

The third phase of VWSA’s electric mobility strategy will see the first fully electric Volkswagen vehicles going on sale in South Africa, with this date not yet announced.

President Cyril Ramaphosa says the initial $8.5-billion to be mobilised over the next three to five years in support of South Africa’s just transition to a low-carbon economy, will facilitate the implementation of the country’s ambitious emission-reduction goals and develop a model for a just transition that could be used elsewhere.

In a message to the COP26 Energy session held on November 4, Ramaphosa reiterated that South Africa required support to achieve its Nationally Determined Contribution targets, which would involve South Africa transforming its coal-dependent energy system at “unprecedented speed and scale”.

“This will include the decommissioning, the repowering and the repurposing of coal-fired power stations and the roll-out of renewable energy.

“But our ability to do so will be determined by the extent of support that we receive from developed economies,” he said.

The political declaration announced with the governments of France, Germany, the UK, the US and the European Union, represented “an important breakthrough in this effort”.

“This will enable us to implement our ambitious goals and to develop a model for a just transition that we hope can be used elsewhere.”

Ramaphosa noted that the energy transition would require developing economies to undertake massive investments in alternative energy sources and other infrastructure.

In addition, some countries, such as South Africa, would require substantial support for workers and communities throughout the coal value chain who stood to lose their jobs and livelihoods.

“A just transition requires finance and support from wealthier nations to enable low- and medium-income countries to protect employment and to promote development.”

The prospect of using the package as a template for similar transactions elsewhere has also been underlined by UK Prime Minister and COP26 host Boris Johnson.

Describing the partnership as game-changing, Johnson said it would “set a precedent for how countries can work together to accelerate the transition to clean, green energy and technology”.

Meanwhile, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany, which is contributing €700-million to the package, would share its just-transition experiences as it supported the decarbonisation of South Africa’s electricity production and the development of new economic opportunities for affected communities.

A task force comprised of South Africa and international partners would be established to finalise the detail of the package, which would include multilateral and bilateral grants, concessional loans, guarantees and private investments, as well as technical support.

The task team would define the scope of the supported actions and the sources of financing over the coming six months.

Funding Africa’s transition to net zero by 2050 is one of the most pressing issues that Africa and the world must address, PwC states in a new report that estimates the cost of such a transition to be about $2.8-trillion.

The ‘Africa Energy Review 2021’ calculates that $33-billion would be required yearly between 2020 and 2030 to place Africa on a path to a net-zero energy mix by 2050. Yearly costs would then rise substantially to $111-billion between 2030 and 2040 and to $142-billion between 2040 and 2050.

Africa emitted only 1.62-million kilotons of carbon dioxide in 2020 against a global estimate of around 33-million kilotons and the continent accounts for only 3% of cumulative global emissions and less than 5% of the world’s yearly emissions.

“Such investment levels are increasingly unaffordable for many African economies and increased reliance on international finance will be needed if progress is to be made towards sustainable access to affordable energy for all Africans,” PwC energy strategy and infrastructure head James Mackay said during a virtual release of the report’s findings.

The report was released only days after South Africa signed a political declaration at COP26 with the governments of France, Germany, the UK and the US, as well as the European Union for an initial $8.5-billion funding package to support South Africa’s just transition to a low-carbon economy over the coming three to five years.

Mackay said financial and technical assistance from developed countries would be critical for Africa’s transition to unfold at the scale and pace required, as well as to address chronic energy poverty across the continent. This despite the fact that 35 of Africa’s 54 countries have undertaken some form of commitment towards net-zero emissions.

Likewise, market reforms would be needed to attract private capital into the African energy sector, which would be dominated in future by wind, solar, hydropower, geothermal, battery storage and green hydrogen.

Total renewables capacity across Africa currently stood at 58 GW, with hydropower contributing 63% of that.

“By 2050, energy production from solar and wind is expected to increase by as much as 110 times and 40 times respectively,” Mackay said.

Africa’s coal and oil energy production, meanwhile, was expected to drop by around 96% and 71% respectively over the same period.

Natural gas, the report said, would continue to play a role in the continent’s energy mix beyond 2050, but a lack of finance and challenging geopolitics would constrain Africa’s potential to participate in any growth in demand over the medium term.

“Africa’s gas reserves are therefore largely likely to remain untapped.”

Mackay cautioned against Africa resisting the transition, describing the global shift towards net zero as inevitable. However, he warned that there was an increasing risk of further energy crises with negative economic impacts on many African countries.

“Africa will need international support to sustainably transition towards net zero,” he averred.

October new-vehicle sales and exports were heavily impacted by the three-week strike in the steel and engineering sector, as well as the return of load-shedding, which affects the local automotive industry’s ability to plan and grow, says Naamsa | The Automotive Business Council.

This was in addition to Covid-19 supply chain disruptions resulting in vessel and container shortages, which, in turn, leads to higher logistics costs, notes the council.

Naamsa reported this week that domestic new-vehicle sales in October increased by 6.1%, to 41 035 units, compared with the same month last year.

Of the total industry sales, an estimated 82.5% represented dealer sales, with 14% of new vehicles entering rental fleets. About 1.4% of new vehicles were sold to industry corporate fleets, with the remaining 2.1% procured by government.

The new-passenger-car market reached 27 496 units in October, which is a 3.1% gain on the same month last year.

Sales of new bakkies, vans and taxis increased by 15.9%, to 11 188 units.

Medium-truck sales declined by 14.4%, reaching 576 units, while heavy-truck and bus sales jumped by 5.2%, to 1 775 units.

October new-vehicle exports from South Africa declined by 30%, to 23 685 units.

This is the fourth month of declining export numbers. However, for the year-to-date, vehicle exports are still 12% ahead of the same period last year.

Eskom CEO Andrè de Ruyter describes the $8.5-billion (R131-billion) financing package announced at COP26 as “an important first step” in light of the fact that South Africa’s energy transition is expected to require investments of between $30- and $35-billion over the coming 15 years.

He says that funding – pledged as part of a political agreement concluded with France, Germany, the UK, the US and the European Union – will support a socially and economically just energy transition in South Africa, while enabling the country to meet its new Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) targets.

“As a major contributor to South Africa’s carbon footprint, Eskom will play a pivotal role in enabling a just energy transition from coal to low- and no-carbon sources of electricity generation,” De Ruyter said in a statement.

Presidential Commission on Climate Change, deputy chairperson Valli Moosa, likewise, welcomed the financial package, which he said would help accelerate the decarbonisation of the South African economy and support a just transition which prioritises the needs of workers and vulnerable communities.

Moosa said that the funding, which would be disbursed over a three- to five-year period, included a combination of grant and concessionary finance, but did not provide a breakdown.

It is understood that the bulk of the funding will flow in the form of concessional loans, rather than grants. However, some grant funding could be available for South Africa to shore up decarbonisation and social plans and to support vulnerable workers and communities.

Details of the transaction, or transactions, were still to be finalised, with a taskforce to be established to identify potential financing instruments and develop a full work programme over the coming 12 months.

Speaking during a virtual discussion on the package, hosted by the Business Day, Meridian Economics MD Grove Steyn, who has done extensive work on a concessional climate package for South Africa, described the announcement as potentially critical for assisting Eskom to make immediate transition-supportive investments and to begin giving practical impetus to the just transition.

However, it was not yet clear whether the deal would assist government in addressing Eskom’s unsustainable debt burden, which would still have to be resolved to enable the unbundled Eskom units of transmission, distribution and generation to approach the capital markets for the funding required for a decarbonised and reliable electricity sector that could support economic growth.

Steyn estimates that about R1-trillion would have to be invested by both Eskom and the private sector across the electricity value chain over the coming ten years to meet that objective even before taking account of the country’s aspirations to build a green hydrogen sector and introduce electric mobility.

“Ultimately, we have to actually fix the underlying structure so that the industry can raise low-cost, long-term funds from the capital markets without government guarantees” Steyn said.

The $8.5-billion package was nevertheless viewed as a landmark for South Africa’s transition and potentially pioneering in defining the just transition aspects of such a transition.

Congress of South Africa Trade Unions (Cosatu) labour market policy coordinator Lebogang Mulaisi said that while the “devil is in the details” she was encouraged by the political declaration’s embedding of the just transition concept as part of the financing package.

Mulaisi indicated that Cosatu would seek to have a direct input in shaping the modalities of the transaction such that workers and their livelihoods were prioritised, including through the possible inspiration of the principle of a jobs guarantee in the future transaction, or transactions that arose from the agreement.

Intellidex capital markets research head Peter Attard Montalto argued that most of the $8.5-billion should be directed the way of initiatives that would struggle to raise finance o...

Grid constraints in South Africa’s high-yield renewable-energy areas need to be addressed urgently, Independent Power Producer (IPP) Office CEO Bernard Magoro has again warned.

Reflecting on the lessons learned from the most recent renewables procurement round during a Power Futures Lab webinar, Magoro said that government had been unable to procure several extremely competitively priced projects during bid window five (BW5) because of an absence of grid capacity.

Following the bidding round, through which 25 projects with a combined capacity of 2 583 MW were identified as preferred bidders, Eskom confirmed that there was no longer grid capacity in the sun-drenched Northern Cape and that the network in the Western Cape was at saturation point.

Magoro said the State-owned utility would need to urgently confirm what capacity remained ahead of BW6, currently scheduled for launch in January.

Likewise, the impact on grid capacity of the recent reform allowing distributed plants below 100 MW in size to sell electricity to third parties and wheel electricity through Eskom and municipal networks would have to be assessed.

Eskom strategic grid planning manager Ronald Marais said that Eskom was assessing various interventions for unlocking more capacity in the Northern Cape, noting that at the start of the renewables programme in 2011 only 1 000 MW of capacity had been available in the province which had been expanded to 3 000 MW by BW5.

He confirmed that Eskom was studying the use of battery energy storage as a short-term solution for easing the grid constraints and for boosting load in the Northern Cape and that the initial results were promising.

“But the constraints will only be alleviated for a period of time and grid strengthening still remains critical to ensure that the grid remains stable and to ensure that we can connect the renewables in time.

“So, we see the batteries as a mitigating factor to buy time,” Marais explained, adding that the acquisition of land for transmission servitudes remained a serious problem that also had to be solved.

Magoro said that, although there had been no formal resolution on how the renewables procurement programme could be aligned with Eskom’s unfolding just energy transition strategy, one option could involve directing IPPs to build in Mpumalanga, where the grid constraints were absent.

“That’s only my view at this point, as we have not had an engagement on the issue and there hasn't been formal agreement with Eskom on how we can collaborate on the just energy transition.”

ALTERNATIVE GOVERNMENT SUPPORT?

Besides the grid constraint, Magoro reported that the IPP Office was also canvassing alternative government support mechanisms to sovereign guarantees.

However, there was a concern that the removal of the guarantee could result in an increase in future tariffs, which have fallen with each successive bid window.

In fact, at a combined weighted average of 47c/kWh, the wind and solar PV tariffs bid during BW5 were the lowest yet secured domestically.

Expressed in April 2021 terms, the BW5 tariffs were 54% cheaper than the 103c/kWh secured during BW4 and a step change from the 312c/kWh, 205c/kWh and 165c/kWh achieved during bid windows one, two and three.

Marogo said discussions on possible alternatives to the guarantees were already under way; a statement confirmed by Standard Bank power and client coverage head Rentia van Tonder, who disclosed that two meetings had already been held with lenders on the issue.

“We are certainly open to any engagement on the sovereign underpin, which to a certain extent has definitely supported the current competitive behaviour among IPPs and the level of tariff that we’ve seen.

“From our perspective, all of this needs to be seen in a future context of an unlocked power market that is moving in the direction of a merchant market and how soon those reforms may materialise, because you can’t just look at one solution in isolation.

Globeleq South Africa Management ...