South Africa now has its first atlas on the geological storage of carbon dioxide in the continent, as part of a global effort to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions.
The atlas provides an overview of the country's energy economy, a roadmap on carbon capture and storage, and the progress made to date in this regard, the National Centre for Carbon Capture and Storage said in a statement, after launching it in Johannesburg on Friday.
"...This represents the first major milestone in identifying potential storage sites in South Africa," spokesman Tony Surridge said.
The production of the atlas, described as a ground-breaking endeavour, was the result of co-operation between the government, state-owned entities and the private sector.
In 2007, the environment affairs department released a long-term mitigation scenarios report, which described a number of actions that had to be under taken to decrease national carbon dioxide emissions between now and 2050.
Included in these alternative interventions was the use of carbon capture and storage technologies.
Surridge said carbon capture and storage was usually done by injecting carbon dioxide into deep geological formations, where it should remain securely stored.
"While this atlas is aimed at providing easily accessible information to decision-makers, a detailed technical report is also available for use by specialists as a basis for future work in this important area," he said.
Speaking at the launch, Minister Dipuo Peters said South Africa had domestic targets and mechanisms for increasing the usage of renewable energies, and for achieving greater energy efficiency.
"It was against this backdrop that government has vigorously engaged in... mitigating greenhouse gas emissions by carbon capture and storage," she was quoted as saying in a statement.
The country's energy economy was largely powered by fossil fuels, primarily coal.
Recognising that coal would continue to be the basis for most of the country's primary energy needs for the next few decades, Peters said the government was "firmly resolved" to increase the use of renewable energy. - Sapa