GAS TO POWER Gas to power in Africa Gas in Africa has seen a lot of growth in exploration and there are interesting dynamics in terms of gas to power. T he global gas sector is becoming diverse and vibrant. There has been the US shale gas boom, which, with the cleanest burning of hydrocarbons and the flexibility gas power provides to grids featuring renewables, has helped Barrack Obama’s government to embrace a climate change mitigation agenda, and to imply restrictions in the use of coal. The question remains unanswered as to whether the success of shale gas in the US can be replicated in other parts of the world. To put into context the size of the shale gas industry in the US, that country produces some 70 billion cubic feet of gas a day (bcf/d), of which 26 bcf/d is shale gas. Thirteen years ago no shale gas was being produced in the US. Africa in total produces 20 bcf/d of gas. A big part of the reason for the success of shale gas in the US is the nature of this industry in that country. It did not only take off because of the advances in horizontal drilling technology, but also because there was a huge social carrot, thanks to the nature of US land rights. A relatively small landholder can lease land to an oil company and this has resulted in a lot of buy-in among local communities. This difference and the exaggerated hype about the contentiousness of shale gas technology lead to questions of whether shale gas production will succeed in other parts of the ESI AFRICA ISSUE 3 2013 world. This anti-shale gas hype is reminiscent of the on-going anti-nuclear hype that continues to exist. To put this thinking into context, as Rob Adam, president of the Nuclear Industry Association of South Africa (Niasa), notes, an amount equivalent to half of the 50,000 tonnes of uranium mined each year globally goes into the atmosphere through the burning of 25 million tonnes of coal over the same period. If the nuclear industry had to push that much uranium into the atmosphere it would be shut down immediately. Similarly, the Fukushima incident, which saw three reactors shut down in a category seven nuclear incident, where no one died, has to be put in context of the 200 or so fatalities that occur annually at South African mines, or the over 10,000 road deaths in South Africa each year. If the same standards apply, South Africa’s mines should be closed and its road transport system abolished, not to mention the fact that the global burning of coal should be banned immediately. The perceived dangers of hydraulic fracturing to tap shale gas should be considered in the same light of uneven human psychology of what risks appear to be acceptable and which not. However, in spite of the fact that the natural gas industry in the US, and Canada where production is much smaller, are among the most regulated in the world, public concerns remain, associated with environmental risks related to 27