South Africa wants to put a Turkish Karpowership generator ship, that has been rejected in South Africa on environmental grounds, in Maputo bay instead.
A decade of state capture and corruption in the state electricity company Eskom has left South Africa desperately short of power and with rolling blackouts across the country. One plan was to use three Turkish Karpower ships - which are floating generators - anchored in the ports of Richards Bay, Ngqura (Coega), and Saldanha. This was finally rejected on environmental grounds by the South African Department of Forest, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) on 10 March. Karpowership also demanded some form of insurance or indemnity against South African state corruption, which was not forthcoming.
So it wants to put a 415 MW floating power plant in Maputo Bay, in a joint project with state electricity company EDM. There would be a 4 km transmission line to a Matola substation and electricity would mainly be exported to South Africa, though existing interconnections. The proposal was first reported by Zitamar last year (11 Nov) and now Bloomberg (30 Mar). The power station would start producing in October using heavy fuel oil, but with a promise to convert to LNG (liquefied natural gas) in three years.
EDM confirmed to News24 in South Africa that it is in talks with Eskom. The Mphanda Nkuwa dam could have been built by now and be supplying 4,300MW to South Africa, but Eskom has for a decade refused to buy any more electricity from Mozambique - linked to massive corruption around the use of South African coal.
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Karpower has had a 115MW floating plant in Nacala harbour since 2016, again in partnership with EDM. For two years, 2016-18 the electricity was for Zambia, then EDM signed a 10-year contract to take the electricity. Karpower promised to convert the generator from heavy oil to LNG, but this apparently has not happened.
Do Electrons Have a Nationality or Colour?
Coal, oil and LNG are physical fuels that are shipped on boats and trains. Electricity is "fungible" or interchangeable. Electricity from the power ship in Nacala was put into the EDM grid and an equivalent amount of electricity taken from the grid at the border 1000 km away and sent across to Zambia . Electricity generated on a ship in Maputo harbour and "sold" to South Africa would be treated in the same way.
But the European Union (EU) has approved a Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) by which carbon-intensive imports into the EU such as aluminium, one of Mozambique’s main exports to Europe, pay a carbon tax. Suddenly the electrons need the colour green. The Mozal aluminium smelting plant in Matola has a contract to use green electricity from Cahora Bassa which has passed through South Africa, but this expires in 2026, and Mozal is desperately trying to renew the contract. This would allow the electrons from the Kapower ship would be painted green by the time they travelled the 10 km to Mozal. But South Africa wants the green electrons to reduce its own carbon footprint, which is very high because it uses massive amounts of coal to produce electricity. Negotiations continue. Mozal is now owned (64%) by Australian mining company South32.
And Mpanda Nkuwa has suddenly become important because it will produce green electrons.
