MIKE MULLER: Fracking lawfare may obstruct the just transition

The huge economic and social transition needed over the next three decades to limit global warming by switching to clean energy poses huge challenges for SA. The chaos in global energy markets serves as a useful warning of the difficulties we will face. But the task will not be made easier if developments that can steadily reduce the country’s carbon emissions while maintaining a reliable electricity supply are obstructed.

That’s why we should be concerned by the department of forestry, fisheries & the environment’s proposed regulations to control fracking — “the exploration and production of onshore oil and gas requiring hydraulic fracturing”.

The 71 pages of regulations are a clumsy cut and paste of standard environmental impact requirements, technical norms on how to drill gas wells, illogical restrictions on how water can be obtained and wastewater disposed of, and irrational (and expensive) requirements for full-time monitoring by independent environmental and heritage experts.

They are so bad that a cynical observer might conclude that the department’s intention is using regulatory lawfare to block developments that offend its environmental lobbies.

Fracking for oil and gas has been going on for more than half a century and its (limited) environmental impacts are well understood. It is a short-term investment that is quick to implement and doesn’t require long-term commitments. That is useful in the current context in which energy futures are difficult to predict. One reason that there is no appetite for a Southern African pipeline from Mozambique’s northern gas fields is that it would need to run for decades to be viable.

The speed with which fracking can be implemented has enabled the US to become the world’s largest exporter of liquefied natural gas this year, up from zero in 2015. Most of that is produced from “fracked” wells.

In SA, this perspective is absent. Environmental campaigners, keen to stop all hydrocarbon use as quickly as possible, have made much of alleged environmental risks. The minister and department of forestry fisheries & the environment have bought into these concerns, as seen in their over-the-top proposals for regulation.

Minister Barbara Creecy has form in this regard. Her misguided efforts to force Eskom to spend about R30bn to wash the Medupi power station’s flue-gases will actually aggravate global warming as well as wasting large quantities of valuable water (“How environmentalists got their aim wrong”, Business Day, August 24 2021). 

The recent obstruction of offshore gas exploration, which might allow Mossgas to keep producing some liquid fuels for the next few decades, is another example. Such exploration has gone on for many years, off SA and in far more environmentally vulnerable waters elsewhere, without the negative impacts that were suddenly alleged.

Critically, stopping gas development in SA will not affect the world’s hydrocarbon production since it will just be produced elsewhere. What it will do is to make SA more dependent on external sources of supply for the energy the country needs. That will cost us local jobs and foreign currency.

During the next few decades, global energy markets will be unstable and it will be critical for SA to sustain some energy self-sufficiency. Yet we are already rapidly losing our local capabilities.

Oil refining capacity is falling because old refineries cannot meet the quality requirements of new internal combustion engines. As we move away from coal, as we must if we want to continue to trade with the rich world, we need to replace coal with gas as the feedstock for Sasol’s liquid fuel production. If Sasol has to import gas, we will become even more dependent on energy imports.

The energy turmoil in Europe and the US, with supplies uncertain and households facing huge price increases, offers useful lessons for SA.

First, wind and solar cannot provide energy security by themselves. For SA to go entirely “renewable”, the complementary investments in transmission and storage would cost far more than the wind and solar farms themselves, as even the promoters of renewable solutions acknowledge.

Second, electricity generated from natural gas can support the energy transition, particularly if it is produced close to existing transmission lines. The US has already show that switching from coal to gas can substantially reduced emissions from electricity generation.

Perhaps most important, domestic energy sources will be critical for energy security. SA will be vulnerable to the coming decades of instability in international energy markets. We do not have easy access to the alternatives available in Europe, which range from Norwegian hydropower to French nuclear power and Danish wind.

It is vital to avoid ideologically driven energy policies. Germany’s political decision to close its nuclear power stations and depend on imported energy has deeply damaged its economy and those of its neighbours. If we allow an environmental lobby to block the option of using our own gas, we risk even greater social and economic damage.

• Muller is a visiting adjunct professor at the Wits School of Governance. He worked on climate and energy strategies for the region as a national planning commissioner focused on economic infrastructure, environmental sustainability and regional co-operation.