JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Renewables company Envusa Energy, which is owned jointly by Anglo American in partnership with EDF Renewables, this week lodged an application for a licence to trade electricity in South Africa’s Northern Cape, North West, Eastern Cape and Limpopo provinces over the Eskom network.

The seven offtakers are located in the Northern Cape, North West and Limpopo and the three generators on the borders of the Northern Cape and Eastern Cape provinces. (See map.)

Mining Weekly can report that the desired date for the licence to take effect is Tuesday, October 31, with the offtakers of the sun and wind energy being a combination of mines, smelters, and other large mining-related electricity users.

The operations to be served are Anglo American Platinum’s (Amplats') Amandelbult underground platinum group metals (PGMs) mine in Limpopo, Kumba Iron Ore’s Kolomela mine in the Northern Cape, Amplats’ Mortimer smelter operation that straddles Limpopo and North West, Amplats' Mototolo PGMs mine in Limpopo, Amplats' Polokwane smelter in Limpopo, Rustenburg PGMs mine in North West, and De Beers’ Venetia diamond mine near the Zimbabwe border and also in Limpopo.

Amandelbult and Rustenburg are described in the application as co-located mines that house a combination of furnaces, compressors and smelters.

A map of the trading area being sought shows three generation plants clustered on the borders of the Northern Cape and Eastern Cape as having a combined capacity of 520 MW of alternating current (ac).

These are the 240 MWac Mooi Plaats solar photovoltaic plant, the 140 MWac Hartebeeshoek wind plant, and the 140 MWac Umsobomvu wind plant. All three have been awarded Strategic Infrastructure Project status.

The durations of the power purchase agreements and the tariffs to be charged per megawatt hour have not been disclosed, but the total price charged to the respective offtakers will be a combination of a blended wind tariff between Umsobomvu and Hartebeesthoek, Mooi Plaats' solar tariff and the wheeling cost.

The energy reconciliation for wheeling will be based on the energy supply agreements already in place between Eskom and the offtaker entities.

Regarding metering arrangements, Envusa has been granted monthly access to the meters on the premises of the generators and the offtakers to perform the reconciliation process with Eskom.

This process involves matching the energy delivered to the offtaker by any of the three generators and setting this off against the offtakers’ actual consumption, carried out in terms of the energy supply agreements that Eskom has in place with the respective offtakers.

Total trading revenues are calculated by applying the electricity price charged by the respective generators to Envusa adding the cost of wheeling.

Regarding human resources, Anglo American Energy Solutions Limited and EDF Renewables South Africa personnel will be seconded to the trading entity.

Envusa's business model involves purchasing energy from generators and selling it to offtakers. It allows for multiple generators of various technologies to sell energy to Envusa, and then Envusa to on-sell that energy to multiple offtakers across South Africa.

As has been reported by Mining Weekly, Anglo envisages that the partnership will be generating 3 GW to 5 GW of clean electricity across Southern Africa.

Not listed in the application is Amplats' large opencast Mogalakwena mine in Limpopo, which is where Anglo’s nuGen™ zero emission haulage solution is giving rise to a far-reaching emission-free mine haulage vision.

In October 2022, Anglo and EDF agreed to a first-phase launch of 600 MW by Envusa. The implementation of the regional renewable energy ecosystem through the partnership would also serve as a clean energy source for the production of green hydrogen for the increased rollout of hydrogen-powered ultra-class mine haul trucks while also supporting the development of South Africa’s Hydrogen Valley.