Fracking in South Africa
Fracking in South Africa is an energy production strategy at early stages of development using high-pressure drilling techniques to release natural gas trapped in shale rock.
[2] Fracking in South Africa is a current topic of debate, with proponents pointing to substantial economic and energy benefits and opponents voicing concerns about potentially adverse environmental impacts.
The Karoo is the geographic area that is the focus of future hydraulic fracturing in South Africa, derived from a word in the local language meaning "dry".
These figures, however, were based on desktop research and would only be refined through an extensive exploration programme [2] In the present day, the Karoo is a semi-desert stretching over 400,000 square kilometers and home to a population of around 1 million people.
[9] Vocal opposition from civil rights and environmental organisations, farmers and landowners in the Karoo lead to a government-placed moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in April 2011.
[9][10] After assembling a task team to evaluate the potential costs and benefits of hydraulic fracking in South Africa, Collins Chabane, minister in the president’s office, announced an end to the moratorium in September 2012.
[8] South Africa has experienced rolling blackouts as a result of energy infrastructure challenges, which disrupts crucial manufacturing and mining capabilities.
[8] South Africa is already involved in Mozambique through domestic oil company Sasol, which is developing turbines powered by gas fields in the country.
In a controversial study commissioned and paid for by Shell, one of the applicants to explore for shale gas in South Africa, developing one tenth of the estimated Karoo for fracking could generate 200 billion rand per year and create 700,000 jobs.
Some analysts have argued that the complicated process of pumping, purifying, and finding necessary materials (such as sand and water) needed for fracking activity imposes too many costs to make the venture profitable.
[7] Finally, proponents contend that aquifers depended on for human use in the Karoo are generally shallow, while shale pockets that could be extracted from are deeper, so contamination is less likely.
[11] However, low rainfall levels and high evaporation make South Africa the 30th driest country in the world, which is especially concerning to many opponents of fracking given the semi-desert environment of the Karoo.
While natural gas may burn cleaner than energy sources such as coal, there is still a danger for the extraction process to release methane into the atmosphere, which is more potent than carbon dioxide.
[18] Proponents are more optimistic that hydraulic fracturing will act as a bridge towards the development of other sources of renewable energy, decreasing the need for coal and oil consumption.
[3] Fracking could also threaten regional food security by destabilizing meat and crop production that occurs in the Karoo, which feeds some of the poorest people of South Africa.
[3] Dr. Marie Jorritsma, an ethnomusicologist at the University of Witwatersrand, argues that there is a deep connection between the people in the Karoo and the environment itself, which is expressed through music (especially in church congregations).
