Brigitte Weidlich
14 November 2008
NAMWATER'S ambitious plan to build a seawater desalination plant for N$1,48 billion just north of Swakopmund will be reviewed and a specially appointed National Desalination Task Force (NDTF) will now look into the matter.
"The urgent need to construct a desalination plant has become unavoidable and up for discussion and investigation is the source of funding," Agriculture Minister John Mutorwa said yesterday.
He said his officials and those of NamWater made a presentation at State House on June 29 about the project.
"A month later, July 29, Cabinet approved the establishment of the NDTF which is tasked to develop and design a detailed project proposal with technical requirements, financial implications and environmental impact assessment," Mutorwa told reporters.
In April this year, NamWater boss Dr Vaino Shivute told the media that a 25-million-cubic-metre desalination plant was on the drawing board outside Wlotzkasbaken.
Tenders would close in May, the construction company would be appointed in June and building the N$1,48 billion plant was supposed to start last month, he then said.
Completion was envisaged for January 2010 and the water would be sold only to uranium mines.
According to the presentation made by NamWater in April, seven new uranium mines were expected to become operational by 2013 and five more in a year.
On August 13 2008, The Namibian reported that NamWater's Dr Shivute said the envisaged desalination plant would be built just north of Swakopmund instead of at Wlotzkasbaken.
The UraMin uranium mining company has started building its own desalination plant near Wlotzkasbaken.
The company had signed a joint venture agreement with NamWater on November 23 2007 for that desalination plant.
NamWater then said it would build a second desalination plant next to UraMin's and would have to borrow money for the project.
The site was this year shifted to outside Swakopmund.
Government officials were yesterday tight-lipped over media questions on why the NamWater project had not yet been started and why a national task force was suddenly appointed.
According to Agriculture Minister John Mutorwa, the task force would look into three options for the desalination plant: a joint venture between Government and the private sector, by Government alone or by a private company without Government participation.
The seven-member NDTF is chaired by Andrew Ndishishi, Permanent Secretary at the Agriculture Ministry, with officials from the same ministry, the Environment and Tourism Ministry and NamWater serving on it.
Asked yesterday when the plant would be built, Mutorwa said it could be in 2010, but could be shifted, "depending on circumstances".
International spot prices for uranium have dropped severely over the past weeks and hover around US$48 per pound, after soaring to over US$100 a year ago.
This has cast doubt on whether all the envisaged uranium mines in Namibia would see the light.
Earlier this week, Uranium One announced it would shut its Dominion Mine in South Africa, citing the currently low uranium price as one of the reasons for the closure.
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