South Africa Slides Towards Gas Crisis

South Africa is facing an impending gas crisis, according to business leaders who warn that the government is sleepwalking into disaster. The country's largest petrochemicals company, Sasol, has warned that in two years' time there will only be enough gas coming from its fields in central Mozambique for its own needs, leaving industries struggling to access gas.

The affected industries account for 8% of the economy and 700 billion rand ($43 billion) in annual economic output, providing 75,000 jobs. Sasol's chief commercial officer, Thomas Shaw, said that South Africa 'doesn't do anything until it's an absolute crisis' and that this situation is still too far away for the government to take seriously.

TotalEnergies has been planning a gas import terminal in Matola with South Africa's Gigajoule Group but has struggled to secure demand. Magali Pailhé, head of Total's exploration and production business in South Africa, said that investing in gas-fired power generation would make the economics of liquefied natural gas terminal projects stack up.