AFRICA
Brand , a former government certified mining engineer at Sasol and an important part of its UCG development , outlined his ambitions .
He said : “ My vision is to optimise the whole coal to electricity value chain . My aim is to safely and efficiently transform our valuable coal resource into a transferrable energy commodity which can be sold to meet local demand . In South Africa we are experiencing a huge electricity demand for what is a large and growing economy , and with aging Eskom power stations we are running out of supply .”
Theunissen Central to Brand ’ s objective is arguably the largest coal deposit in the Free State province near Theunissen , bought from BHP Billiton in 2012 , and one ideally suited to UCG due to its coal being at an average depth of 350 to 500m .
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Number of years the projects 50MW power station can be kept running with coal converted syngas
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