South Africa will lift its long-standing moratorium on shale gas exploration once new regulations are published later this month, the country’s Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources, Gwede Mantashe, said on Thursday.
The moratorium, imposed in 2011, halted the processing of new applications for reconnaissance permits as well as exploration and production rights.
The ban followed widespread public opposition and legal action from environmental campaigners who raised concerns about the potential impact of hydraulic fracking in the ecologically fragile Karoo region.
Earlier on Thursday, a post-cabinet statement confirmed that South Africa’s environment minister had finalized the shale gas regulations, which are expected to be released before the end of October.
“Once those regulations are gazetted, I lift the moratorium,” Mantashe told Reuters. “The economy needs a growth trigger and oil and gas are those triggers.”
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South Africa, which relies heavily on coal-fired power plants for its electricity, views gas as a key component of its energy transition strategy.
The new regulations will establish a framework to manage environmental and safety issues linked to shale gas extraction, particularly water-related challenges in the semi-arid Karoo region.
As Africa’s most industrialized economy, South Africa currently depends on natural gas supplied via pipeline from Mozambique.
With those gas fields nearing depletion, the country is seeking new sources to sustain industrial demand.
The nation’s first liquefied natural gas import terminal is also under development at Richards Bay.
The Petroleum Agency of South Africa estimates that the Karoo Basin holds about 209 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of technically recoverable shale gas resources.
However, a 2017 study by geologists at the University of Johannesburg suggested a much wider range, from 13 tcf to 390 tcf, and noted that the actual recoverable quantity is likely closer to the lower end of that estimate.
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