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2012-05-17 22:18

Cape Town – The shale gas under the Karoo is a blessing from God, Energy Minister Dipuo Peters told MPs on Thursday.

Speaking at the end of debate on her department’s budget vote in the National Assembly, she said it was Ascension Day, “when Jesus ascended to heaven to sit next to God”.

Peters then suggested it would be wrong not to use hydraulic fracturing, also called fracking, to exploit the resources God had left behind.

“It would be wrong for us to not use the resources that God left us with. This is a blessing that God gives us, and we need to exploit for the benefit of the people.”

The people of the Karoo were “going hungry”, she said.

Earlier on Wednesday, Peters told a media briefing at Parliament that if economical quantities of shale gas were proven to exist under the Karoo, “let us extract it”.

She said it had to be extracted safely.

Cabinet is expected to receive a report on shale gas exploration in the Karoo by the end of July.

Peters told journalists on Wednesday: “It is my wish and prayer on a daily basis that when the report is tabled… it will say to us the gas is there, and you can extract it safely for the benefit of the people of South Africa.”

As if the many egregious errors and lies in Josh Fox’s seminal anti-fracking film, Gasland, weren’t enough, the US Environmental Protection Agency has just declared the water of the film’s star location, Dimock, Pennsylvania, safe to drink.

The agency will remain vigilant and continue to investigate a few unclear results, but four rounds of testing and thousands of documents of evidence later, no significant danger to the drinking water posed by the gas-drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, could be substantiated.

Meanwhile, the UK government has been fretting that its own reserves of shale gas, now estimated at a mere 150 billion cubic feet, are not enough to bother with. But this, and the much-ballyhooed reduction in the estimated reserves in US shale gas formations, are not reasons to give up on the Karoo. On the contrary, it establishes a competitive advantage. After all, the estimated Karoo Basin reserves are three thousand times bigger than those in the UK.

Technically recoverable shale gas reserves:

Source: Energy Information Administration, 2011.

The indefinite moratorium imposed by minerals resources minister Susan Shabangu on the application for exploration or production permits to exploit shale gas in the Karoo Basin remains in place, so these estimates cannot yet be confirmed.

However, energy minister Dipuo Peters has declared herself hopeful that an investigation report due to be tabled before Cabinet by July will find gas drilling to be safe enough to proceed. Business Report declared: “It’s a done deal on fracking.”

This is good news for anyone who thinks a relatively inexpensive, plentiful and clean domestic source of energy will be good for the economy. It is very good news for the depressed towns of the Karoo, where real unemployment sometimes runs to 90%, according to an April 2011 article in Farmer’s Weekly, forwarded to me by its reporter, Roelof Bezuidenhout.

“Karoo people have always joked that the only hope for their dorpe [small towns] lies in finding oil, but that the only oil here is the leak under Uncle Tommy’s car,” he wrote, noting that welfare grants might actually outstrip farming as a source of income in many towns.

There is a reason why the Karoo Shale Gas Community Forum, a public interest group that includes a range of community organisations representing churches, youth, human rights activists, workers and small farmers, has come out in support of gas drilling. It labours thanklessly, without the funds, celebrity appeal or media support of its bigger rival, the Treasure the Karoo Action Group, and has distanced itself from the knee-jerk environmentalist opposition to shale gas drilling. Local communities know that wealthy environmentalists and a few big landowners whose mineral rights have been nationalised don’t speak for small farmers, the working poor and the unemployed.

Bezuidenhout’s article “almost caused my lynching by members of the [Treasure the] Karoo Action Group,” he told me in an email. “So I just went back [to] farming, hoping they’d find gas under my kitchen.”

Peters touched on a very real threat if the groundless but vociferous opposition to fracking continues to delay matters: “Those skills (in the oil and gas sector) would be lost if we do not exploit that which we have,” she told Business Report.

In a recent debate in which I participated, the Second Annual Shale Gas Conference hosted by the Institute for International Research, Bonang Mohale, chairman of Shell South Africa, said as much to Jonathan Deal, the chairman of the Treasure the Karoo Action Group.

Deal said his group was gearing up to challenge in court any favourable findings by the ministerial investigation group. The risk of such obstructionism, Mohale pointed out, is that companies such as Shell can easily decamp to more favourable climes. There is only so much fracking equipment in the world, and only so many qualified drilling engineers. The same could happen to South Africa’s shale gas prospects as the problems encountered by the local building industry when Dubai was hogging the world’s limited supply of heavy cranes, he said.

A similar argument was true for the opposition to Walmart’s acquisition of Massmart. The company was looking for an entry into the burgeoning African market, and if South Africa was going to make it difficult for the company to invest here, there were certainly other options. “Nigeria is open for business,” a US diplomatic source told me at the time.

In shale gas, our biggest likely competitors are the US, China, Poland and Argentina, all of which have big estimated reserves and are actively promoting their domestic drilling industries.

This growing supply in the world market points to another reason, besides competing for scarce skills, why shale gas in South Africa should be developed sooner rather than later. The international price of natural gas has been falling for four years. It is at its lowest point in 10 years, at about $2 per million British Thermal Units. It peaked in 2005 and again in 2008, at over $15 and $13 respectively, but the successful exploitation of primarily US reserves has put great pressure on prices.

This is great news for energy consumers, of course, who benefit by having an inexpensive, clean alternative to coal for power stations and even oil for transport. However, the downside of the boom is that low prices have already called into question the financial viability of some of the world’s top gas drilling firms, such as Chesapeake Energy.

A further natural-gas-price decline could make some global reserves uneconomical to exploit, which could stifle investment in the sector. The first regions to suffer will be those that still need much initial investment, exploration and infrastructure development, like South Africa. It risks losing out to its competitors in the shale gas sector, much like it lost out on the global mining commodities boom because of decrepit transport infrastructure, legal uncertainty about mining rights and high labour costs.

One by one, the arguments against shale gas drilling are falling apart under scrutiny. Several previous columns of mine have demonstrated that most of the claimed risks are either grossly exaggerated or outright false. Anecdotal evidence of accidents resulting in pollution do exist, but they are few and far between, and the industry continually gets better at preventing them. The risks are small and manageable.

The economic benefits of shale gas drilling are debatable, but unquestionably positive. A study was conducted for Shell by the late Tony Twine of Econometrix. It was based on the Keynesian multiplier effect of investment on an economy and proved highly optimistic. One may have grave doubts about this means of economic forecasting (and I do), but if even a small fraction of the anticipated benefits are realised, the benefits would outweigh the risks.

Frankly, as much as Karoo residents stand to gain, the most significant benefit to South Africa is not job creation, corporate profit, tax and royalty revenue, infrastructure or skills development. The biggest gain would be domestic access to a large supply of inexpensive, clean fuel for generating electricity in gas-turbine power stations, which have many benefits over both nuclear and coal-fired alternatives. It’s not like South Africa doesn’t need some cheap electricity.
To realise any of these benefits, however, South Africa needs to get cracking on fracking. The window of opportunity won’t remain open forever. DM

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INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPERS

Western Cape premier Helen Zille. Photo: Ayanda Ndamane

A year the 2011 local government polls, the DA claims it has put to rights much of the “damage” wreaked by the ANC in the 13 municipalities it snatched.

Most of the new DA-run municipalities were off to a good start, “cleaning out the stables they inherited” and salvaging municipal finances, DA leader Helen Zille said in a report on the party’s achievements in the past year. She added that it took some months for the full extent of the “damage” to become apparent.

The DA won 13 new councils – Bitou, Breede Valley, Drakenstein, George, Hantam, Hessequa, Karoo Hoogland, Knysna, Laingsburg, Langeberg, Nama Khoi, Saldanha Bay and Witzenberg.

Zille said the outgoing administrations were, as a rule, anything but co-operative.

“Issues included missing documents, break-ins, harassment and theft, as well as damaged, broken or stolen equipment.”

In many cases, she said, these actions were not simply vindictive, but apparently designed to destroy records, including clues to corruption.

The four biggest new DA municipalities – Breede Valley, Drakenstein, George and Saldanha Bay – were nearing financial collapse.

“Unaffordable excesses like international travel, food for councillors, mayors’ cars and, most costly of all, jobs for pals, meant that most of these councils faced a crisis of liquidity,” Zille said.

The new DA administrations were also hamstrung when taking corrective action, as all had to operate using budgets passed by the previous ANC administrations in the last few days before elections.

“In three municipalities – Bitou, Drakenstein and Hantam – the last ANC budget did not even cover staff salaries for the next year. Under the new DA administration all three were forced to take emergency measures… just to pay staff.”

Breede Valley’s financial crisis epitomised the situation at all these local councils.

Zille said the ANC had continued to spend freely, despite the recession.

“When the DA came to office, our first business was to cut this undisciplined expenditure on ‘nice-to-haves’. In the three largest new DA municipalities, Breede Valley, Drakenstein and George alone, these cuts saved some R140 million in the first year (2011/12). This process continues into the second year of DA governance.”

Zille added that one of the biggest inherited problems in municipalities was the blurring of the critical distinction between party and state.

“Many municipal managers under the ANC display openly partisan behaviour,” she charged. She made reference to a Saldanha case where the municipal manager – a former ANC party secretary for the Boland region – appointed a number of party members to the municipal housing and social services departments. “Despite the 18 officials in its housing department, Saldanha Bay constructed only 646 houses in 2010, while DA-run Swartland, a smaller municipality with only two housing officials, built over 2 000.”

Zille accused the ANC of treating municipalities as employment agencies, but said the new DA administrations had already demonstrated that impartial and honest administration was the key to delivery.

But she conceded that it would take a long time to turn around the affected municipalities, before people started to see and feel results.

Asked to comment, ANC’s metro chairman Xolani Sotashe rubbished Zille’s report card as yet another DA public relations exercise.

There was a forensic investigation into shady deals involving officials of the city of Cape Town, he said, “but as expected, the DA remains quiet about it”.

Sotashe added the city had for two consecutive years failed to spend its budget, “and it appears that for the current financial year the DA-led city will again have an under-spending problem”.

He pointed out that Cape Town Mayor Patricia de Lille conceded last week that there were continuing inequalities.

“The DA was going around saying that the city was on the brink of collapse when they took over, when in fact the municipality had well over R2 billion in reserve in 2006.”

warda.meyer@inl.co.za

Weekend Argus

2012-05-21 08:52

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Photos: Surprising Sanbona

Located a mere three-hour drive from Cape Town, Sanbona Private Game Reserve is full of pleasant surprises.

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Nadia Krige

The radio in the front of the game viewing vehicle crackled to life, not for the first time during the drive, but this time it held a good deal more promise. Whether it was the intonation of the distorted voice on the other end, or just the way our ranger immediately zoned in on the barely discernible morsel of information being imparted, I don’t know.  But somehow I knew this would be exciting.

“Well, it seems like we might have a lucky game drive after all. What do you guys say about seeing some lions?” Alwyn finally said, as he carefully placed the radio back in the rustic cradle he’d grabbed it from a moment before.

My heart gave a little leap. I had heard much about Sanbona’s lions – especially the rare white ones – and was secretly dying to see them for myself, to catch even just the vaguest little glimpse. While I had encountered white lions once before at a big cat park somewhere in Limpopo, the experience had been marred by the obstruction of electric fences. Call me a painful puritan, but experiencing animals in their natural environment, roaming around gloriously free, has always been my preference.

Thus my response was instantaneous: “I say… What are we waiting for?! Let’s go!” Fortunately my fellow game-viewer agreed and we let the rough and tumble dirt track take us, ducking as acacias waved us on with their thorny arms.

A surprising destination

Now, while all of this may sound suspiciously much like a bushveld adventure, the truth is it took place in a perfect patch of the Western Cape where the vast spaces and wide blue skies of the Little Karoo meet the rolling hills of the Overberg and the wholesome, champagne air of the Winelands. Located just beyond the hot spring town of Montague, nestled into the Warmwaterberg mountains, Sanbona Wildlife Reserve is a surprisingly quick and picturesque three-hour drive from the Mother City.

The second surprising thing about Sanbona is its size: made up of no less than 19 rehabilitated Karoo farms, it covers a whopping 54 000 hectares, making it roughly the size of Singapore and the fourth largest private game reserve in South Africa.

Lodges

However, with only three lodges spread out across the park, it manages to maintain a distinct atmosphere of exclusivity and intimacy. In fact, a strong sense of belonging is communicated to guests throughout the various steps of arrival: getting to the gate, meeting a transfer vehicle at the stunning welcome lounge, and being delivered to your final destination, one of the lovely lodges. 

We were lucky enough to hop off at the very first stop, Tilney Manor, named after Thomas Tilney, a magistrate of Swellendam during the late 1800s/early 1900s who had lived in the stately settler-style house, now the lodge’s main building.

We were the only guests for the evening and had almost the entire team consisting of assistant manager, Jerome, ranger, Alwyn and a waiter bearing warm cloths, stream out the front door to welcome us. What made it even more special was the fact that this warmth didn’t disappear with the welcome, but remained right until our departure.

We stayed in one of the six beautifully furnished, open plan suites, surrounded by a lush garden of indigenous plant species and healthy green lawns. From the delectable dishes served up at meal times to the little folded towel-elephant we found at the foot of our beds, Tilney Manor’s hospitality was beyond top class. Each of the six suites accommodates only two adults, so this ensures that it’s pretty private and exclusive even at full capacity.

The other two lodges are equally picturesque and both hold their own charm. Dwyka is perfect for a romantic break – honeymoon, anniversary or just some solid rekindling – with its selection of 9 fairy-tale like luxury tents, each boasting its own private deck complete with plunge pool, while Gondwana is the best option for families with little kids, as it offers a playroom, ample space and a super cool skull garden to explore.

Big 5 – white lions

Sanbona’s biggest drawcard, however, is the fact that it has the big five, as well as the only free-roaming, self-sustaining white lions in the world. At present the reserve is home to four adult female lions – two tawny and two white – and two cubs, belonging to one of the white females.

In a strange twist of fate, the two resident male lions, one of whom had sired the cubs, both died within days of each other sometime at the end of 2010. According to Alwyn, the exact cause of death has never been cleared up, as their bodies had already started decomposing upon discovery, rendering autopsy results inconclusive. A thorough inspection of the site, however, revealed no human interference, leading them to believe it must have been a natural cause, perhaps a snake bite. While plans are being made to bring in a replacement male or two, it is still too risky with the growing cubs, and alpha male lions tendency toward infanticide.

We were fortunate enough to see three of the reserve’s feline grand dames, but sadly not the mom with the cubs, lazing in the last rays of Saturday’s sun. As far as the rest of the big guns go, we spent some time watching a herd of peaceful elephants indulge in a lush green meal, and caught a reassuring glimpse of a beautiful white rhino far in the distance, but the reserve’s specially reared disease-free buffalo and secretive Cape Mountain leopard remained elusive. However, a skittish black-back jackal, a herd of regal eland, two necking giraffes and a troupe of playful baboons, among many others, did a good job of keeping us entertained!

While it is often the big creatures that capture our attention, Sanbona is also a sanctuary to one of the most critically endangered little creatures of our time: the Riverine Rabbit. These cute creatures have a very limited distribution, occurring only in the central and southern regions of the Little Karoo, making Sanbona prime Riverine Rabbit property. The chances of seeing one are, however extremely small, as they tend to hide in their water-side burrows for most of the day, only daring to explore in the early hours of the morning. Sanbona is playing an incredibly important role in the conservation of this rare creature.

A few favourite moments

While wildlife may be the reserve’s most prominent attraction, it’s by far not the only thing it has to offer. These are a few of the other experiences I thoroughly enjoyed:

Hiking up to a cave with both bushman and Khoi-San paintings inside. There are a few of these sacred sites around the park, make sure you ask your guide to take you to at least one – it really is an incredible experience being up close to these eerily awesome artworks that date back 4000 years. What makes this specific cave quite special, though, is the fact that it’s rather rare to find both bushman and Khoi-San paintings on the same site, providing the perfect opportunity for a thorough comparison.

Stargazing at Tilney’s pool. With its great expanse of streetlight-less earth, the Karoo has always been a great spot for reveling in the beauty of the night sky. Nothing like peering at Orion’s sword hilt, the binary of Alpha and Proxima centauri as well as Mars through the magnifying lens of a telescope to put things in perspective.

Coffee and drinks breaks on the drive. Whether for early morning coffee or sundowner drinks, stopping for a break during a drive is always a treat. We got to enjoy a steaming cuppa overlooking a bird-encrusted dam, and later, a ice cold GT with an endless view of hills, mountains and valleys.

Check out the Sanbona website for more details or give the Shamwari Group a call on +27 (0)41 509 3000.

 

Independent Newspapers

The Minister of Energy Dipuo Peters. Picture:Christiaan Louw

South Africa is well on its way to embracing a nuclear and shale gas energy future with little likelihood that even if a vast reservoir of gas is found in the Karoo that the government will scale back plans to build new nuclear power plants.

This emerged during a briefing by Energy Minister Dipuo Peters and her director-general Nelisiwe Magubane ahead of the Department of Energy’s budget vote last week.

Pressed on her favourable stance towards hydraulic fracturing – which a Royal Dutch Shell survey indicated could produce R80 billion for the gross domestic product of the country even if the resource was found to be limited – Peters was asked whether the government would consider scaling back a nuclear build programme if the shale gas resource was found on a large scale. “If the extraction for shale gas is agreed to by cabinet, we don’t see it replacing (the nuclear option),” she said.

Her response was emphatic that a nuclear component to the energy requirements remained a deep-seated commitment of the government.

She also emphasised that any nuclear build programme should be carried out “in collaboration” with other countries and that the process should not be so localised that South Africa ended up using “technologies not used elsewhere”. It was clearly a reference to the failed – and recently scrapped – pebble bed nuclear reactor project.

However, nuclear power was part of the plan for South Africa, particularly when one considered the growing power needs of the country.

On shale gas extraction, which is done by injecting water and chemicals deep in to the earth under great pressure, she said this procedure had benefited the US tremendously at a time when petro-chemical costs had risen sharply.

Noting that a decision on a technical report would be presented to the cabinet on fracking in July, she said: “Those skills (in the oil and gas sector) would be lost if we do not exploit that which we have.”

During the debate Anton Alberts, the Freedom Front MP, said: “Let me warn the minister: fracking will be the ANC’s third suicide scandal, the first being the arms deal and the second the Gauteng e-toll system.

“We will be watching who positions themselves to get what tenders.

“And we will, with the rest of the world, oppose this ill-founded idea to make money out of nature.”

ID energy spokesman Lance Greyling said the current 20-year energy plan required all South Africans to shoulder the risk of massive investments.

If nuclear energy came on stream for a price that was not globally competitive, these companies could decide to expand their operations elsewhere, leaving us with the problem of “extremely expensive stranded assets”.

Asked if the government had held talks with nuclear energy companies like France’s Areva and the US-based Westinghouse, Peters said this would not be appropriate before any bidding process for the build programme was started.

15 May 2012
Last updated at 17:21

Broadband speeds will vary depending on where consumers live

Mystery shopper tests conducted by Ofcom have revealed that UK providers are failing to inform customers about broadband speeds.

While some were usually upfront about the maximum speed users could expect, others were not.

TalkTalk and BT were the worst offenders, offering users a speed estimate without prompting in fewer than half of cases.

Providers agreed last year to better inform new customers.

Overall speed estimates were offered without prompting from the mystery shoppers in 59% of cases.

The providers most likely to give callers an estimated speed were Karoo (76%), Sky (72%) and Plusnet (67%).

There is often a big disparity between advertised speeds and what consumers will actually get.

Internet service providers (ISPs) have been accused of misleading the public by advertising speeds as “up to…” when few will actually be able to achieve the headline speed.

Campaigners are keen for new rules to make it easier for consumers to know exactly what they are getting from services.

Processes changing

There are many factors that affect what speed customers will get, with the distance they live from the telephone exchange being the principal one.

In July 2011, ISPs agreed with Ofcom to offer customers maximum speed estimates for the area they live in as early as possible in the sales process.

Both TalkTalk and BT have agreed to change their processes following the mystery shopper tests.

“We strongly support the Ofcom speed code of practice and ensure that anyone who buys BT broadband gets a personalised speed quote before they are committed to purchase,” said a BT spokesman.

“Ofcom has suggested we should make a minor change to mention the speed quote earlier in the sales conversation, which we are happy to do and will implement straight away.”

“It is vital that as the choice of broadband services expands, UK consumers get the best possible information when choosing a broadband provider,” said Claudio Pollack, Ofcom’s consumer group director.

Disappointing results

Michael Phillips, managing director of Broadbandchoices.co.uk, said the tests showed that more needed to be done.

“Speed is at the centre of a customer’s decision to buy broadband, so the findings that only 59% of ISPs gave an unprompted speed estimate over the phone is disappointing,” he said.

“It’s clear that the current voluntary code leaves too much open to ISP – or call centre operator – interpretation and ultimately this means that it lacks any real teeth.

“Ofcom should be far more prescriptive as to when – exactly – a potential customer should be informed of the likely speed of the service.

“In the real world, customers like my mum wouldn’t know to prompt the operator for this information and could be at risk of making an uninformed purchasing decision.”

The regulator said that it would conduct more tests next year.

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SA is facing one of the largest problems with invasive plant species in the world, with the fynbos biome particularly vulnerable. PHOTO: SAM CLARK

Scientists from universities and institutions around SA descended into the Klipbokkop Mountain Reserve area near Worcester – where the fynbos kingdom merges with the Little Karoo – to check out the alien invasion.

They were part of the fourth annual Toyota Enviro Outreach project, a 12-day expedition in the second half of last month involving botanists, zoologists, entomologists and taxonomists from the universities of Johannesburg and Stellenbosch, the KwaZulu-Natal and East London museums and the South African National Biodiversity Institute at Kirstenbosch.

It was part of the international Barcode of Life (iBOL) project, the biggest biodiversity genomics initiative yet undertaken, to safeguard our natural wealth and reduce biodiversity loss by creating a digital identification system for life on Earth.

SA is facing one of the largest problems with invasive plant species in the world, with the fynbos biome particularly vulnerable.

The fynbos kingdom, unique to the Western Cape and a considerable pull for overseas visitors, is the smallest floral kingdom in the world, yet it is the most richly endowed with plant species.

This latest Enviro Outreach project was aimed at identifying invasive alien species and to plan the eradication, containment and management of these species before they spread, as well as to help prevent the introduction of these species into other countries.

The search area included the Klipbokkop Mountain Reserve and other montane reserves as well as coastal reserves in the Hermanus and Rooi Els/Kogel Bay areas.

The specimens collected and their DNA barcodes will be available on the Barcode of Life database and will enable rapid identification of invasive species in SA.

The head of the African Centre for DNA Barcoding and professor of botany and plant biotechnology at the University of Johannesburg, Michelle van der Bank, said: “While lots of invasive plant species were collected, including several species of acacia and hakea from Australia, other charismatic fynbos species were also found.

“It was surprising how many native species were encountered in flower, as autumn is not the main flowering season in the Cape.

“After finding half a dozen lilies and as many lily-boring weevil species, the insect and plant team had the amazing luck to find one weevil actually in association with a lily. For the first time we can at least record this association.”

More than 750 species represented by approximately 1 450 individuals were collected, including 450 species of plants, 25 species of molluscs, 32 species of fresh and seawater fish and 250 species of insects.

In Bainskloof, the snail group, which included Dr Dai Herbert of the KwaZulu-Natal Museum in Pietermaritzburg, found a very rare and poorly known species (ulbaghiniaisomerioides), which was last recorded in 1800.

This snail seems to be confined to the mountains between Wellington, Ceres and the Grootwinterhoek and belongs to a family of snails, the Dorcasiidae, endemic to south-western Africa. Most of the species live near the coast or in near-desert environments, but this one occurs in montane fynbos.

The fish group, which included Zambian Dr Monica Mwale, a world authority on coastal estuary fish from the Institute of Aquatic Biodiversity at the University of Johannesburg, was excited to identify and collect 10 different species of klip fish out of the known 40 or so species in tidal pools along the coastline.

A rare find was a species of sea barbel in Kogel Bay not known to frequent this area.

The core funding for this barcoding programme in SA comes from the Working for Water programme.

Dr Guy Preston, deputy director-general for environmental programmes in the Department of Environmental Affairs, said: “The ability to identify species with certainty and speed will be critical in our efforts to control invasive alien species.”

– Weekend Argus

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INLSA

Premier Helen Zille

Premier Helen Zille is keen to pursue a controversial, lottery-based HIV testing campaign because the verdict is in on the 16 day pilot programmeme.

The incentive-based campaign tested 15 096 people and added 37 operating testing sites in the Western Cape from November 25 to December 10, 2011. Spokesperson for the premier’s office, Zak Mbhele, said yesterday that the government was still gathering final statistics as evidence of the programme’s overall success, but used the example of Central Karoo to show an increase in HIV testing as a result of the campaign.

“In the Central Karoo district, 600 people tested in just three days,” he said. “That’s normally the average figure they have in a month.”

Anyone tested during the 16 days of the campaign was entered into a raffle, and six names were drawn to receive prizes – five R10 000 winners and one grand prize winner that received R50 000. Contrary to speculation, winners did not have to test positive, they only had to test.

Mbhele thinks the numbers speak for themselves and believes the initial uproar about the campaign was a common response to something new and untested.

The normal approach to HIV education in the country revolves around people’s “good will to get tested,” he said. “Now there is the realisation about message fatigue that people have around HIV education and public awareness… we couldn’t leave [testing] to chance.”

“Even small incentives can have quite major influence on the behavioral choices people make,” Mbhele said. “You can influence the choice architecture in how people make decisions.”

Before implementing the programme, the premier’s office met Harvard University consultants to study behavior choices.

“We looked at how people make choices and decisions in their everyday lives,” Mbhele said.

There are no existing plans to organise a similar campaign in the near future, but according to Mbhele, “the premier would like to continue along this line of HIV testing campaigning.”

“She still must have a high level discussion with the senior officials in the health department,” he said. “[The programme] must have the budget and human resources capacity to handle it before we start it.”

The programme took heat from organisations like the SA Medical Association. Its spokesperson Mark Sonderup is “concerned that testing is made out to be the end all, be all.”

It’s not-so in that respect [the campaign] is not the most optimal use of resources,” he said. “No one can refute the fact that numerous people were tested, but for me, the programme isn’t sustainable,”

“Undue emphasis is being placed on this magical ‘let’s get people to test’,” said Sonderup.

abigail.dennis@inl.co.za

Broadband companies are failing to offer a speed quote to potential customers in 41% of their sales calls, in breach of a code introduced last year to protect consumers.

A mystery shopping exercise carried out for telecoms watchdog Ofcom tested how many broadband providers followed the rules by offering an estimated speed without prompting by the customer.

TalkTalk was the worst offender, offering an unprompted quote in just 47% of cases, compared to an average across all providers of 59%. BT Total Broadband was the second worst, offering a quote in only 48% of calls.

Since July last year, a voluntary code signed by all the largest internet service providers requires them to inform potential customers of their likely maximum speed, in the form of a range, as early as practicable in the sales process.

This should happen well before customers are asked to place an order or hand over their financial details.

The mystery shop, which involved 1,369 approaches online and over the phone, found that BT’s agents only provided detailed speeds once the customer had agreed to proceed with an order.

Customers need to receive the information in writing, in their online account details or be prompted to write down the quote.

Both BT and TalkTalk have agreed to address the issue by amending their staff training and sales processes.

A BT spokesman said: “Ofcom has suggested we should make a minor change to mention the speed quote earlier in the sales conversation, which we are happy to do and will implement straight away.

“Overall, Ofcom found that the level of compliance with the code has improved since our previous mystery shopping exercise in 2009.”

A spokesman for TalkTalk said: “No one enters a contract with us without receiving a speed estimate tailored to them. Anyone can log onto our website and get an accurate speed estimate, based on the capabilities of their phone connection.”

Speeds for customers on the same broadband package can vary widely depending on how far a home is from the local telephone exchange.

Many broadband providers are now reluctant to advertise headline speeds, which means customers are dependent on individual quotes in order to compare services.

“If you are trying to get the best deal it is very difficult when there is such variability,” said Ofcom director Claudio Pollack.

“What really matters is to be transparent to customers about what they are paying for, and give them the right to end a contract if what they get comes below that commitment.”

The best performers were Karoo – part of the Kcom group in Hull and East Yorkshire, which complied in 76% of cases – Sky at 72% and Plusnet at 67%.

Overall, Ofcom found that the level of compliance with the code has improved since our previous mystery shopping exercise in 2009.

Responding to Ofcom’s research, Marzena Lipman, policy manager at campaign group Consumer Focus, said: “The most common problem for broadband consumers is ending up with a slower broadband speed than they expected.

“So, while it’s good news there have been improvements, it is disappointing that this research shows many providers still aren’t being as up-front with their customers as they should be.”

INLSA

Energy Minister Dipuo Peters

The Energy Ministry came out with all guns firing for hydraulic fracturing – referred to cautiously as the “f-word” on Tuesday – as it could help turn around Africa’s energy fortunes, reduce dependence on dirty fuels like coal and create masses of jobs in the Karoo.

It is the strongest signal yet that the government is about to end the moratorium on exploration for shale gas. Last week, Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu promised that the cabinet would decide on fracking by next month.

At an oil and gas conference hosted by Ostrac, an empowerment group involved in gas and oil industry training, Energy Minister Dipuo Peters entered the fray and spoke of the untapped wonders of hydraulic fracturing, which Western Cape Finance, Economic Development and Tourism MEC Alan Winde would only refer to as “the f-word”.

Noting that the International Energy Agency had declared that the world was entering “the golden age of gas” and it was necessary to “enter a conversation… including (about) the f-word”, Peters said she was a member of the cabinet which had decided to place a moratorium on exploration for shale gas but she “wished at the same time” that when the report emerged there was a “safe way of going ahead with this”.

While the report by a multi-departmental task team was still secret, Peters was optimistic it would deal properly with the concerns of water contamination and environmental “considerations” while tapping into the Karoo’s potential, including that relating to tourism.

Exploration work has been halted for nearly 18 months in the Karoo but the minister’s remarks indicate that the government is poised to give the industry a green light with the Science and Technology Department helping to ensure that the controversial procedure uses technology that limits environmental damage.

Fracking involves injecting vast amounts of water deep underground – with various chemicals – to extract natural gas from shale rock. Environmentalist groups such as Treasure the Karoo, headed by Jonathan Deal, have long argued that the process could severely damage underground aquifers in the semi-desert area.

Deal said Tuesday: “One doesn’t have to be a palm reader to know where they’re heading.” In 140 places around the world there were reservations about fracking. And in Romania and Germany, two-year moratoriums were being considered, he said.

Speaking at his farm in the Karoo, Deal said South Africans should not be seduced by promised economic benefits. “We’re not opposed to economic development. We want South Africa to flourish, but it has to be sustainable and sensible.”

Peters, meanwhile, made no bones about her focus on the gas part of the oil and gas equation. Picking up on Winde’s hope that an industrial development zone would be declared by year-end, she said the proposed zone at Saldanha Bay would be a suitable storage hub for liquid fuels.

Working with China, it was possible that Saldanha would become “a halfway storage point for the West (and) a pick-up point for the East”. Oil and gas could be exported to China and other emerging countries from the Western Cape.

Peters added that the government’s growing support for fracking was based on its job potential. She referred to the affect it would have on reducing the number of people on security grant, which is a particular problem in the vast Karoo. The money could be used instead “to support the economy”.

The value of gas exploitation in the US was being felt, said Peters. In Europe and the UK, the gas price had “gone south” at the very time there was upward pressure on the oil price.

14 May 2012 – South African minister of minerals Susan Shabangu says that a technical report on shale gas will be submitted to the Cabinet in July at the latest after exploration for this resource in the country’s Karoo region was suspended in 2011 to enable further study on the matter. That followed protests regarding the environmental effects of hydraulic fracking.

Bloomberg reports that the government halted plans for hydraulic fracturing as it studied the environmental repercussions of allowing companies including Royal Dutch Shell, Falcon Oil Gas and Bundu Oil Gas to employ the practice. Fracking, which involves blasting water mixed with sand and chemicals underground to free trapped hydrocarbons from shale formations, has already been banned in France.

South Africa, a net oil importer that’s threatened by power shortages, has the fifth-largest technically recoverable gas resources of 32 countries, an initial assessment commissioned by the US Energy Information Administration shows. The country has about 485 trillion cubic feet of shale, according to the study that was published last year.

Developing one-tenth of that may boost the economy by about R200 billion a year, a study by Johannesburg- based research company Econometrix and commissioned by Shell showed earlier this year.

Shale gas can play an important role in energy production, energy minister Dipuo Peters said in March this year. The government is “cognisant of the controversies associated with shale-gas extraction processes such as ground water and soil contamination, however with ongoing developments I am confident that these challenges will in the not-so-far future come to pass,” she said.

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GE ENERGY, a supplier of power generation technology, was keeping an eye on emerging opportunities in renewable energy, hydrocarbons and nuclear in southern Africa, Jay Wileman, its president and CEO, said on Friday.

SA’s budding renewable energy industry and the looming nuclear fleet programme, shale gas potential in the Karoo, natural gas discoveries in Mozambique, and coal-bed methane potential in Botswana make southern Africa an attractive destination for companies such as GE Energy. Coal-bed methane is natural gas extracted from coal beds.

Mr Wileman said GE was watching the developing renewable energy industry in SA. “We are looking at some of the wind projects. There are exciting capabilities. But we are not only considering wind projects. We will look at solar as well,” he said.

He said GE Energy intended to forge ties with local partners that would see it involved in the life cycle of local projects beyond its traditional role as an equipment supplier. “We need to go beyond that.”

Solar and wind technologies have the biggest share of the 3725MW that the South African government has set aside for independent power producer (IPP) projects in the IPP procurement programme.

The Department of Energy will soon announce the preferred projects for the second “window” of the bidding programme. Last year it allocated 1415MW out of the 3725MW mainly to wind and solar projects. A total of 2209MW will be allocated in future “windows”.

GE Energy is watching developments in other African countries. These include Mozambique, which has seen natural gas discoveries. In Botswana, coal-bed methane is emerging as a potential alternative fuel for power generation and transport. SA is mulling over the potential of shale gas.

“There are a lot of opportunities,” Mr Wileman said. GE Energy had developed shale gas expertise in North America and Brazil. “We are ready to bring that to SA,” he said.

GE Energy’s parent company, the US energy conglomerate General Electric, and natural gas producer Chesapeake Energy earlier this year announced plans to develop new infrastructure to accelerate the adoption of natural gas as a transportation fuel in the US.

The New York Stock Exchange-listed Chesapeake was one of the companies keen on potential shale gas resources in the Karoo.

njobenis@bdfm.co.za

May 14 2012 at 10:29am
By SAPA

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Pillay said the NRC’s membership of JIVE recognised the country’s contribution to European data from the Hartebeesthoek Observatory and the newly built radio astronomy facility KAT-7 in the Karoo. Source: Google Maps

Johannesburg – South Africa has joined the international JIVE radio astronomy research institute, the National Research Foundation (NRF) said on Sunday.

This marked a new level of partnership between Europe and South Africa in science, said NRF deputy CEO Dr Gansen Pillay.

“It is expected to act as an additional mechanism in promoting the growth of science in South Africa, with developmental benefits well beyond the field of radio astronomy,” he said.

JIVE, or the Joint Institute for Very Long Baseline Interferometry, is an international institute funded by national research councils in nine countries in Europe and beyond.

It works in various fields of galactic and extragalactic radio astronomy, planetary and space sciences.

South Africa has long provided data to JIVE through its Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory.

Pillay said the NRC’s membership of JIVE recognised the country’s contribution to European data from the Hartebeesthoek Observatory and the newly built radio astronomy facility KAT-7 in the Karoo.

“We are most excited that this collaboration will aid in promoting South Africa’s commitment to the science of astronomy and forge more international science relations,” said Pillay. – Sapa

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AUTHOR and poet Louis Leipoldt called it one of the seven wonders of the old Cape Province when it created access through the Swartberg mountains to the north for farmers and travellers. But today people come from across the country, not to travel to the other side of the rugged mountains but to wonder at Seweweekspoort’s kaleidoscope of rock formations that dwarf all who enter this grand canyon.

The poort cuts a swathe through the Swartberg Nature Reserve, a World Heritage Site, from the nearby mission village of Zoar on Route 62 between Calitzdorp and Ladismith for 17km, to emerge on the northern side of the Karoo where the gravel road continues to meander towards the N1 and the town of Laingsburg.

But it is to the poort itself that visitors come. No sooner has one entered the narrow ravine when giant walls of rock, aged in shades of ochre and brown, rise up on either side, leaving only sufficient space to allow passage along the gravel road that shares the floor of the poort with the Huis River. The road twists and turns in harmony with the river as at times the rippled sandstone walls, created by volcanic force millions of years ago, shut out the sun and seem to create an impenetrable barrier to progress before the road takes another daring turn to reveal a way forward.

There is some debate as to how the poort gained its strange name. Some say it took seven weeks for mounted troops to escort a gang of highway robbers through the almost impassable surroundings, while others believe the poort was named after a local missionary, Reverend Zwerwick who did his good work in the area.

It is possible the name is derived from the seven weeks fern (seweweeksvaring in Afrikaans) which grows in crevices and moist spots. I favour the belief that it got its name from the time it took brandy smugglers to transport their ill-gotten cargo through the poort to Beaufort West. It certainly has more mystique than Huisrivierpoort (House River poort), which it might well have been called if left to those with less imagination.

Construction of the road through the poort began in 1859, initially using convict labour under the direction of AF de Smidt, brother in law of legendary pass builder Thomas Bain, who probably gave the team a few tips along the way. It was completed in 1862 and still remains a twisting and turning gravel road demanding all the attention of the driver to negotiate the bends at speeds only a little faster than the horse-drawn wagons of the past. De Smidt’s base camp was in a place called Aristata, named after the rare Protea rediscovered here in 1952.

Today little has changed. There is not even electricity, but it is the only place where one can stay in the poort. There is just enough space between the cliff faces to accommodate a few old farm houses where guests can stay in rustic accommodation beside the river and surrounded by the ever-present mountain walls.

Once an inn for passing travellers, the thick walls of the main house ensure cool comfort in summer and warmth in winter, while a swimming pool fed by a spring is an ideal spot to relax and enjoy the spectacular surroundings.

On a clear night the sky between the mountain peaks is alive with stars.

We decide the best way to view the splendour is slowly on mountain bikes and leave Aristata to pedal the gradual incline upstream. We lose count of how many times the road crosses the river via narrow causeways but it must be close to 30. Certainly frequent enough for us to refresh ourselves regularly in the crystal clear running water. But despite being summer and normally hot in this part of the Karoo, the floor of the poort remains cool, only the midday sun warming us as its rays reach between the walls.

While the ride is leisurely with regular pauses to admire the contorted rock shapes twisted into hideous angles as if to permit access for the road, we do hasten the pace when the overhanging rocks appear ready to rumble and flatten everything in their path.

A thatched picnic spot beside a cave, an ideal place for the robbers and smugglers of old to hide, provides a welcome picnic break. Along the road we pass the remains of an old toll house where legend has it the ghost of the tollkeeper may occasionally be seen on stormy nights. He appears in the road swinging his lamp to attract the attention of the occasional motorist, but when they stop he disappears into the night with a chuckle.

As the cliff walls part before us, giving us sight of the steep mountains ahead, we catch a glimpse of the tallest Seweweekspoort peak, which at 2325m is the highest in the Swartberg — and the highest mountain in the Western Cape.

Then the mountain walls envelop us once again, shutting out any view of the way ahead and we follow the trusty road as if in a giant maze expecting the way before us to be barred by a massive krantz. But just when it seems it will be impossible to proceed, the road makes a hairpin bend and we are able to continue our zigzag journey.

Reluctantly we arrive at the end of the poort and begin our ride back to Aristata. This time we are a little faster as we are travelling in the same direction as the river on a gentle decline, twisting and twining between the flexures and curves of this mountain chasm.

We pause at an unmarked track and follow it to the Tierkloof dam, built recently between the rock faces to provide a reliable source of drinking water for nearby Zoar

It has not taken us seven weeks, not even seven hours, to travel through the poort, but we cannot help sharing Louis Leipoldt’s wonder at the grandeur of the surroundings.

• Aristata Seweweekspoort, rates from R350 a night, (028) 551-2355, www.7weeks.co.za.

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