Staff and post-graduate students at the University of Turin, Italy,attended a seminar earlier this year on South Africa’s natural resources and their geo-ethical use. The speaker was Dr Chris Hartnady, technical director of Cape Town-based earth sciences consultancy Umvoto Africa.
The event was organised by Umvoto in collaboration with Dr Marco Giardino, lecturer in Applied Geomorphology in the Department of Earth Sciences (Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra) and Elana Ochse, Associate Professor in the Department of Culture, Politics and Society at the University of Turin. In a presentation entitled Fossil fuels and the National Planning Commission – How South Africa should be thinking about its natural resources, Dr Hartnady covered three main topics: Global oil shocks and the era of extreme energy; Southern African coal resources; and Karoo shale-gas development (fracking). “There are no simple solutions,” said Dr Hartnady. Inexpensive, high-yield fossil fuels are dwindling, and emit dangerous levels of greenhouse gases. Large reserves of natural gas, oil and coal remain, but accessing them entails spiralling investment costs and environmental risks. Investment costs are largely borne by the public sector via infrastructure subsidies (water, transport, extractive energy) and there are unaccounted-for environmental externalities (generally apparent only after project closure). Environmental risks include land- and habitat-degradation and possibly irreversible damage to natural capital (surface and sub-surface water resources and clean air). There is also Increased human and societal exposure to new technological hazards and catastrophic risks. Dr Hartnady summed up the predicament in the words of M. King Hubbert, who created models to predict oil production’s peak: “The knowledge essential to competent intellectual leadership in the impending difficult situation is pre-eminently geological– a knowledge of the earth’s history and evolution of its organisms, a knowledge of the earth’s mineral and energy resources.”
“There were a number of good questions, mainly from University staff and some retired professors,” said Dr Harnady. “We also made some excellent contacts and Umvoto may contribute to a new post-graduate module in Disaster Risk Management at the University of Turin.”
Dr Hartnady gave a similar presentation the following week in Johannesburg (5 June, World Environment Day) at The Greenest Event in Sandton. This annual event was launched in 2011 to provide business leaders with an incisive look at current environmental issues facing South Africa. For more information: www.umvoto.com | www.greenest.co.za | http://geologia.campusnet.unito.it/do/docenti.pl/Show?_id=mgiardin Contact: Dr Chris Hartnady chris@umvoto.com/ 021 788 8031 (office) Issued by: Judy Bryant Communications On behalf of: Umvoto Africa Contact: Judy Bryant judybryant@telkomsa.net | 0832867168
