The Minerals Council South Africa on Tuesday applauded the establishment of an engineering task team to assess challenges at state utility Eskom’s power stations. Cash strapped Eskom has struggled to meet electricity demand and was forced for several days last month to implement rolling blackouts to avoid overwhelming the national grid. 

ASX-listed Orion Minerals on Tuesday announced that it had signed a renewable energy generation collaboration agreement with Juwi Renewable Energies South Africa to investigate the renewable energy generation potential at the Prieska zinc/copper project, in South Africa’s Northern Cape province. The preliminary scope of the collaboration is to assess the feasibility of a dedicated 35 [...]

Gauteng Finance MEC Barbara Creecy expressed optimism on Tuesday that the province’s experience in developing a pipeline of blended-finance projects would position it well to tap into the new infrastructure fund being developed by national government. Delivering a R132.4-billion budget for 2019/20 in the Gauteng Provincial Legislature, Creecy noted that the Gauteng Infrastructure Finance Agency [...]

Carlos Ghosn’s impending release from a Tokyo jail is in jeopardy after prosecutors appealed a decision granting bail to the fallen car titan after 107 days in custody. The prosecution responded just hours after a Tokyo court approved the release of the former Nissan Motor chairperson on bail of 1-billion yen ($8.9-million). The authorities didn’t [...]

JSE-listed services, trading and distribution company Bidvest’s headline earnings for the six months ended December 31, 2018, increased by 10% year-on-year to R2.1-billion, while headline earnings per share (HEPS) increased by 9.6% to 629.1c. The group declared an interim dividend of 282c a share, representing a year-on-year increase of 10.6%.

Integrated alternative and renewable energy business Renergen’s subsidiary, Tetra4, now has a total proven methane net gas reserve of 40.76-billion cubic feet and a proven helium net gas reserve of 1.01-billion cubic feet, following an updated independent reserve review undertaken by MHA Petroleum Consultants. The updated reserves represent a 12.2% increase in methane and a [...]

Credit ratings agency S&P Global Ratings has revised its outlook on Eskom to stable from negative, following Finance Minister Tito Mboweni’s announcement of R23-billion a year of additional funding to the debt-laden State-owned electricity utility. The ratings agency affirmed its 'CCC+' and 'zaB' sub-investment grade ratings on the company. “The stable outlook on Eskom reflects [...]

Dutch prosecutors are preparing criminal charges against Royal Dutch Shell over its $1.3-billion acquisition of Nigerian offshore oilfield OPL 245 in 2011. Shell said in a statement on its website that it had been informed by the Dutch Public Prosecutor's Office (DPP) that it had nearly concluded its investigation and is preparing to prosecute Shell [...]

The gazetting of the area dedicated to platinum-using fuel cell development in the Springs area is expected to be complete by May this year, Impala Platinum (Implats) group executive refining and marketing Sifiso Sibiya said this week. Responding to Mining Weekly Online during the Implats media roundtable on Thursday, Sibiya confirmed that the company would [...]

Virtual Reality (VR) has hitherto been associated largely with the gaming industry. But as rates of digital penetration rise and the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) increases the demand new skills sets, the technology is also becoming a mainstream business and skills-development tool. Management consultancy Accenture notes that while passive learning and memorisation have featured prominently [...]

Coal mining and marketing company Wescoal said on Thursday that it would be acquiring the assets, liabilities and employees of the Arnot coal mine in Mpumulanga from Exxaro in partnership with Innovators Resources, the shareholders of which are previous Exxaro employees retrenched during the shutdown of the operation in 2015. Wescoal interim CEO Dr Humphrey [...]

LSE- and JSE-listed packaging and paper group Mondi reported underlying earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) of €7.4-billion for the year ended December 31, 2018. That was 19% higher than the Ebitda reported for 2017 and translated to an underlying operating profit of €1.3-billion, which was up 38% compared with 2017, and basic [...]