Anglo American Project GAIA - Proposed Development of a Solar PV Facility and associated infrastructure at the Amandelbult Mine, Limpopo Province

Amandelbult Solar PV (Pty) Ltd seeks to apply for Environmental Authorisation (EA) and Water Use Authorisation (WUA) to develop a solar photovoltaic (PV) facility and related infrastructure at the Amandelbult Complex, located in Thabazimbi Local Municipality, Limpopo Province.

The Amandelbult Complex consists of two underground platinum shafts (Tumela and Dishaba) between the towns of Northam and Thabazimbi in the Limpopo Province. The Project will mostly be located on Portion 1 of the Farm Elandskuil 378 KQ and to a lesser extent on Remaining Extent of Farm Elandskuil 378 KQ, and Portions 0 of Farm Middelaagte 382 KQ and Farm Amandelbult 383 KQ.

The Project involves the construction of a solar PV facility on an approximately 226-hectare (ha) parcel of land and will consist of the following components:

• Development of a 150 MW solar PV facility including mounting structures, inverters, onsite transformers and sub-station, electrical cables and instrumentation and control;
• A new 750 m 132 kilovolt (kV) overhead powerline that will connect to the new onsite sub-station and will loop-in-loop-out (LILO) into the existing Eskom owned 132 kV overhead powerline;
• Lengthening and widening of an existing gravel access road that will connect the Project to the existing district road (D1639) via three additional access road linkage alternatives;
• Two water reticulation pipeline networks and storage tanks to provide water to the Project;
• A Reverse Osmosis (RO) plant, evaporation pond for water treatment and two reject water pipelines; and
• Ancillary infrastructure such as laydown area(s), conservancy tanks, internal access and maintenance roads, operation and maintenance (O&M) buildings, site camp, temporary storage, fencing, gates and access control.

SLR Consulting (South Africa) Pty Ltd (SLR) have been appointed by Anglo American Platinum to undertake the EA and WUA for the Project.

Status

Notice is hereby given, in terms of the EIA Regulations, 2014 promulgated under NEMA, that the draft Environmental and Social Scoping Report (ESSR) prepared for the above-mentioned project has been made available for a 30-day public review and comment period from 5 September - 7 October 2024.

Should you and/or your organisation wish to comment on any aspect of the draft ESSR, comments should be forwarded to SLR at the email address and telephone number shown above. For comments to be included in the draft ESSR, they should reach SLR by no later than 7 October 2024.

By providing your personal information to submit a comment, you will be included in the SLR an Interested and Affected Party (I&AP) database, and you consent to SLR managing your information in accordance with the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013. It is assumed that as an I&AP for this Project you authorise SLR to retain and use your Personal Information as part of a contact database for this and/or other Social and Environmental Impact Assessments (ESIA) and that you confirm your acceptance for SLR to contact you regarding this and/or other ESIA processes. SLR will not process your Personal Information, other than as permitted or required by ESIA processes, or as required by law or public policy. SLR will use reasonable, appropriate security safeguards to protect Personal Information, and to reasonably prevent any damage to, loss of, or unauthorised access or disclosure of Personal Information, other than as required for ESIA processes or as required by any Law or public policy. You may request for your Personal Information to be deleted from the I&AP database at any time by contacting SLR.