{"id":244649,"date":"2022-12-02T17:38:45","date_gmt":"2022-12-02T15:38:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/article\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership\/"},"modified":"2022-12-02T17:38:45","modified_gmt":"2022-12-02T15:38:45","slug":"saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership\/","title":{"rendered":"Saldanha Bay residents voice support for Karpowership"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"article_body\">\n<p><a class=\"bigger-image\" href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/media\/uploads\/images\/photographers\/Ashraf%20Hendricks\/karpowership-20221121-6v2a6370hr.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" alt src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"caption\">The ayes have it. Saldanha residents voiced their support for the Karpowership deal. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Many residents and fishers of Saldanha Bay voiced their support for the Karpowership deal, saying it will ease the burden of load shedding and create jobs.<\/li>\n<li>Karpowership\u2019s first application was refused by the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) due to \u201cgaps\u201d in their environmental assessment and lack of proper public participation.<\/li>\n<li>Environmental NGO Green Connection, who oppose the deal, complained that Karpowership did not directly reach out to fishers.<\/li>\n<li>Karpowership told GroundUp it would supply hundreds of jobs and add 1,220MW of power to the country\u2019s grid.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>At a public meeting held in Saldanha Bay as part of Karpowership\u2019s regulatory requirements, many residents expressed their backing for the controversial electricity-generation deal, despite environmental organisations opposing the \u201cflawed\u201d deal.<\/p>\n<p>Karpowership runs powerships (literally a ship that produces power) that use fossil fuels to generate electricity. <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt class=\"leave\" height=\"1\" id=\"gu_counter\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership.gif\" width=\"1\"><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe support this project,\u201d said Samuel Moorkroof, who was speaking on behalf of the West Coast Black Business Alliance. Moorkroof said that some media reports have claimed that people of Saldanha Bay were wholly opposed to the deal, but that this wasn\u2019t true. He said many people in Saldanha supported the Karpowership project.<\/p>\n<p>GroundUp sat in on the public meeting held in Saldanha Multipurpose Centre on 21 November. About 50 people, including representatives of local business and fishing organisations, attended the meeting and most showed support for the Karpowership deal. One man at the meeting said that he was not in support of the deal.<\/p>\n<p>In March 2021, three Karpowerships, to be based in Saldanha Bay, Coega, and Richards Bay, were listed among eight preferred bidders as part of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ipp-rm.co.za\/\">Risk Mitigation IPP Procurement Programme<\/a> (RMIPPPP) of the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy (DMRE) in a 20-year deal worth over R200-billion. In June last year, the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dffe.gov.za\/mediarelease\/karpowershipEIAdecision\">refused<\/a> Karpowership initial environmental impact assessments (EIAs).<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/amabhungane.org\/stories\/210514-powerships-how-the-multi-billion-rand-tender-was-legally-rigged\/\">Investigations by amaBhungane<\/a> in May last year suggested that the tender process was rigged in Karpowership\u2019s favour, among other irregularities. In January this year, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.news24.com\/fin24\/companies\/industrial\/karpowership-rival-loses-court-bid-to-halt-deal-it-claimed-was-corrupt-20220131\">a court challenge<\/a> by a competitor that sought to overturn Karpowership\u2019s appointment was dismissed.<\/p>\n<p>Many of the Saldanha residents that spoke in support of the deal noted that unemployment and poverty were widespread, and that the effects of load shedding have exacerbated these problems.<\/p>\n<p>Saldanha Bay is the Local Municipality with the highest unemployment rate in the West Coast District, despite being the biggest contributor to GDP, according to recent <a href=\"http:\/\/westcoastdm.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/West-Coast-DM_Final-amended-IDP-2022-2027-2.pdf\">statistics<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Public meetings were also held in Richards Bay and Ngqura last week. It was Karpowership\u2019s second attempt to hold public meetings, after the initial environmental impact assessments (EIAs) were <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dffe.gov.za\/mediarelease\/karpowershipEIAdecision\">refused<\/a> by the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) in June 2021. The DFFE found that there were \u201csignificant gaps and limitations\u201d in the EIA, that proper public consultation didn\u2019t take place, and that it lacked a necessary underwater noise impact study.<\/p>\n<p>Karpowership redid the EIA process, appointing Triplo4 as the environmental consulting organisation, whose mandate included hosting the public meetings held last week.<\/p>\n<p>The Green Connection, an environmental organisation, criticised the public meeting, claiming that Karpowership did not directly reach out to fishers in the area to arrange consultations at the most suitable times. The Green Connection did not attend the meeting.<\/p>\n<p>GroundUp asked Neville Van Rooy, community outreach coordinator at the Green Connection, why there was overwhelming support for Karpowership at the meeting. Van Rooy claimed that on the day of the meeting, taxi violence kept some people from attending the meeting, that some fishers who opposed the deal were out on the water, and that they requested another meeting but that this fell on deaf ears.<\/p>\n<p>Natasha Adonis, spokesperson for the Green Connection, said that they are against using Liquefied Natural Gas for electricity generation. Adonis said the \u201conly way to properly address the country\u2019s energy crises is with the help of a clear, well thought-out and inclusive energy plan, which \u2026 also takes climate change into account\u201d. She said while they understand that \u201cwe won\u2019t switch off gas tomorrow\u201d, the exploration for and extraction of fossil fuels has to stop.<\/p>\n<p>The fishing community seems divided on the Saldanha Karpowership project. Following the meeting, GroundUp spoke to Charlton Swigelaar, secretary of the South African Pelagic Fishermen\u2019s union, who said that load shedding is \u201churting\u201d the people of Saldanha Bay.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith the economic benefits that come with a project as big as this one we will be able to get on our feet. Our communities are struggling and in need of opportunities that can help them get jobs and make money,\u201d said Swigelaar.<\/p>\n<p>He said that Karpowership had explained to concerned fishers the kind of impact the powerships would have on marine life and that they were certain that \u201c[their] livelihoods will be protected\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Paulina Mali of the Saldanha Bay Black Business Women\u2019s Association also gave the organisation\u2019s support to Karpowership. \u201cWhy can\u2019t we get Karpowership? Because at least we will have power and electricity,\u201d she said to GroundUp afterwards.<\/p>\n<p>Nkululeko Dhlamini, Karpowership spokesperson, said that 1,525 jobs will be created during the construction phase and another 240 full-time jobs will be added during the operations for Saldanha Bay. A total of 1,220MW of power will be added to the grid by the three powerships.<\/p>\n<p>Karpowership will also be allocating R27.7-million towards skills development in Saldanha Bay with the intention to \u201censure increased local employment\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Dhlamini said that Karpowership is bringing a solution that will help ease load shedding and will also bring jobs to coastal communities.<\/p>\n<p>The deadline for public comments is 13 December 2022, after which the DFFE will have to decide on its approval.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"article_copyright\">\n<p>\u00a9 2022 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a <a href=\"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nd\/4.0\/\" rel=\"license\">Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.<\/p>\n<p>We put an invisible pixel in the article so that we can count traffic to republishers. All analytics tools are solely on our servers. We do not give our logs to any third party. Logs are deleted after two weeks. We do not use any IP address identifying information except to count regional traffic. We are solely interested in counting hits, <b>not tracking<\/b> users. If you republish, please do not delete the invisible pixel.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership.jpg\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.groundup.org.za\/\">Source: GroundUp<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ayes have it. Saldanha residents voiced their support for the Karpowership deal. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks Many residents and fishers of Saldanha Bay voiced their support for the Karpowership deal, saying it will ease the burden of load shedding and create jobs. Karpowership\u2019s first application was refused by the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":244650,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9928],"tags":[28001],"class_list":{"0":"post-244649","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-groundup","8":"tag-groundup","9":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/12\/saldanha-bay-residents-voice-support-for-karpowership.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/244650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}