27 September 2010
To contribute towards South Africa's energy capture and storage roadmap, Anglo American has joined hands with the South African National Energy Research Institute (SANERI) to launch the Atlas on the Geological Storage of Carbon Dioxide in order to combat global warming and climate change.

Anglo American's financial support for the development of the Carbon Atlas has ensured that the Council for Geoscience (CGS) is able to develop and publish the initial assessment of storage potential in a user friendly atlas. This will ensure that databases of the CGS and Petroleum Agency SA will be available to the project along with data that is already available in published scientific literature such as the Soekor exploration work of the sixties and seventies.

In her address during the launch of the Atlas on Friday, 10 September, in Sandton, the Minister of Energy Resources, Dipuo Peters said, "This is a historic event and a culmination of many hours of much toil and painstaking commitment. Although this Atlas does not signal the end of the process, it is a major milestone worth celebrating. South Africa is endowed with an abundance of coal and sunlight; and it is imperative that we use our God-given resources efficiently, effectively and in an environmentally sustainable manner to meet our various needs. South Africa is a coal-based economy and coal contributes about 66% to our primary energy supply.

As a greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, contributes towards global warming and climate change. This negative environmental impact resulting from the use of coal, as well as other fossil fuels albeit to a lesser extent compared to coal, is a global challenge and one which South Africa has committed itself to address in collaboration with other citizens of the global village."

Anglo American, manager of Climate Change & Energy, Stan Pillay said, "Our approach to climate change is underpinned by a number of strategic interventions. These include a focus on energy efficiency, carbon reducing synergy projects, low-carbon technologies and adaptation to climate change."

Pillay added that Anglo American participates in a number of carbon sequestration initiatives, ranging from carbon capture and storage (CCS) to biological sequestration.

"In 2009, Anglo American became a founding member of the Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute (GCCSI) which is an important global initiative that aims to facilitate the development and deployment of CCS projects. "The GCCSI will bring government and industry together and will support the G8 countries' goal of developing at least 20 industrial-scale CCS projects by 2020," continues Pillay.

According to the SA Carbon Atlas Programme Manager, Marthinus Cloete, "CO2 would need to be captured from industrial flue gases and then geologically stored by compressing it into liquid form and injecting it into deep geological formations, such as saline reservoirs, coal seams, or depleted oil and gas fields. It is also possible to track and learn from international developments in capture technology, but it is essential for storage potential to be determined locally."

"The Atlas will illustrate the distribution and ranking of potential geological CO2 storage reservoirs in South Africa, including the initial estimated CO2 storage capacities, the main emission sources, location of industrial hubs, transportation pipelines and other factors that may have a bearing on storage feasibility," Cloete concluded.

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For further information, please contact:

South Africa
Pranill Ramchander, Media Relations
Tel: +27 (0)11 638 2592

Editors Notes:

Anglo American
Anglo American plc is one of the world's largest mining companies, is headquartered in the UK and listed on the London and Johannesburg stock exchanges. It's portfolio of mining businesses spans precious metals and minerals – in which it is a global leader in both platinum and diamonds; base metals – copper and nickel; and bulk commodities – iron ore, metallurgical coal and thermal coal. Anglo American is committed to the highest standards of safety and responsibility across all its businesses and geographies and to making a sustainable difference in the development of the communities around its operations. The company's mining operations and extensive pipeline of growth projects are located in southern Africa, South America, Australia, North America and Asia.
www.angloamerican.com