South Africa Launches Africa’s First Waste to Energy Facility

Africa’s first waste-to-energy facility has been opened in the Athlone Industria, Cape Town. Speaking at the official launch earlier this week, Mayor Patricia de Lille called it a “very exciting addition to our city’s green economy”… as the Mother City continues to build its reputation as one of the green capitals of the world.

She said the R400-million investment, developed by New Horizons Energy, will convert solid waste into biogas with waste that might otherwise have gone to landfill sites in Cape Town.

The project will also reduce greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to creating jobs and reducing unemployment with 500 indirect jobs and 80 direct jobs.

Western Cape Premier Helen Zille, who officially launched the plant, said: “It is a four-fold win: cheaper electricity prices, lower carbon emissions, more foreign investment and more industrialisation. This ultimately means more local jobs.”

The City of Cape Town has decided to move away from “simply being a distributor of electricity to also generating energy and thereby giving residents a greater choice of what kind of energy they want to use and how much they want to pay for it”, said De Lille.

Cape Town is also working closely with the City of Stockholm to “see if we can replicate the methodology they are using where they are successfully producing biogas fuel from sludge from the wastewater treatment plants for their bus fleet.”

♻ Follow @WCGov110Green for updates from today's launch of the @NHWaste2Energy plant in Athlone. @CityofCT @CEAfrica @thegreencape pic.twitter.com/7xhnb2JXVE

— Western Cape Gov (@WesternCapeGov) January 25, 2017

Another brilliant green innovation:

https://twitter.com/MichaelMpofu/status/824194825226514432