Finding cost-effective solutions for SA's power supply

© Gina Sanders – za.fotolia.com

The more expensive Eskom power becomes, the more domestic fires people make. The more fires they make, the greater the health risks from pollution inside and outside their homes.

Certainly there are no easy answers to South Africa's power supply and air pollution problems, and this is why Eskom has invested in eight university chairs in various aspects of power plant engineering and skills development.

The Chair in Emission Control is located at the North-West University's Potchefstroom Campus, where responsibilities for the Chair are shared between the Coal Research Group in the Faculty of Engineering and the Climatology research group in the Faculty of Natural Sciences.

Monitor pollution

Climatology's job is to monitor air pollution from power generation and consumption, including Eskom's power station stacks and domestic burning. Engineering's task is to help fix the pollution problems by developing or refining processes for emission control.

Finding cost-effective solutions is an important part of the work, according to Prof Hein Neomagus of Engineering and Prof Stuart Piketh of Climatology. This is because the cost of emission control solutions could have a direct impact on the already climbing price of electricity.
"In the near future, stricter emissions standards will apply to Eskom, mainly for particulate matter, and nitrogen and sulphur oxides," says Prof Neomagus. The conventional option for cleaning up these gases would be to retrofit existing power stations. This could cost the economy billions of rands as the equipment has to be imported and would almost certainly affect the price of electricity.

"Retrofitting would come at enormous cost to the economy and we would still not have solved the health problem," says Prof Piketh. He explains that higher electricity prices would undoubtedly compel even more South Africans to cook and heat their homes by burning wood and coal.

Controlling emissions

This is why it is so crucial to find the most cost-effective technologies for controlling emissions, and to explore various other ways of reducing emissions from industry, vehicles and domestic sources. A few examples are using clean coal that does not emit hazardous particles insulating homes so that they burn less coal and encouraging people to use LP gas rather than wood and coal for cooking and heating.

Coal quality is a major problem in South Africa because of its high ash content, Prof Neomagus says. "Worldwide, coals with an ash content of less than 15% are used for electricity generation. In South Africa, coals with an ash content of up to 45% are processed."

This is mainly because South Africa exports its best coal, leaving the dregs for local use. South African coal also contains high levels of nitrogen, which results in the formation of another major pollutant, nitrogen oxides.