Industrial Gases Introduction
Gas was first introduced in South Africa with the construction of the Cape Gas and Coke Company in Cape Town in 1847. Other gas plants followed in Port Elizabeth, Kimberly, Grahamstown, and eventually Johannesburg in 1892. In South Africa, natural gas accounts for 2% of the primary energy demand, but this is expected to grow to approximately 7% over the next ten years but that coal will remain the dominant energy source. For the past 17 years, o ne prominent supplier of gases, has been supplying the industry in the Port Elizabeth Metropole with bulk LPG/Air in vapour form via their unique reticulated network. It is the only company in the Eastern Cape which offers industry the advantage of pipe fed LPG. The pipeline consists of an underground pipeline covering approximately 37 km. The pipelines covers the main industrial centres situated along Paterson Road, Kempston Road, Cape Road, Russell Road Harrower Road and most parts of Korsten.
Location : Maps
Products
Products include oxygen and acetylene for industrial purposes, oxygen for medical uses, LPG for industrial, household and recreational usage. A wide range of specialised gases are also produced such as argon, helium, carbon dioxide, propane, hydrogen and nitrogen for industrial applications.
Propane and LPG are sold in the industrial heating fuel markets while liquid Nitrogen and liquid Oxygen produced by the air separation plant are sold to the local gas industry. Carbon Dioxide is used extensively in the soft drink industry. The gas utilisation ranges from the domestic, catering and leisure markets to the bulk, automotive, industrial, agricultural, mining and commercial markets.
Cylinder gas in the form of LPG and speciality gas are supplied to low to medium volume users whereas for medium to large volume users, bulk gases are distributed via bulk liquid tankers or in the case of Port Elizabeth, via pipeline.
Current legislative/regulatory tools
The South African White Paper on Energy Policy 1998 has described gas as an attractive option and states that the government is committed to the development of the gas industry.
The Gas Act, 2001 (Act No 48 of 2001) The Gas Act promotes the orderly development of the South African piped gas industry. The Act envisages the granting of licenses for the construction, operation and trading for transmission, distribution, liquefaction, regasification and storage within a set framework of requirements and limitations.
Volumes – Annual tonnages
Depending on supply and demand, the two largest distributors of gas in the Port Elizabeth area supplies a combined total of over 32 000 tons per annum to the Eastern Cape area. Of this, 3 000 tons are transported by pipeline within the industrial areas of Port Elizabeth.
Taking into consideration the other suppliers of gas, one can then assume that the Eastern Cape consumes approximately over 40 000 tons per annum, of which approximately 37 000 tons is transported by road to various users within the Eastern Cape and just outside the periphery.
Transport Modal Use
Road, rail and shipping are used for the transportation of gas. The bulk products are brought in by ship and rail. At times, road is used in emergency cases when the refineries is offline. Under normal operations, 95% of the road transport is done in-house, this figure can be reduced in event of emergencies. The road fleet is made up of rigids, articulated and interlinks and the vehicle types are liquid bulk tankers (bulk) and dropsides (cylinders). With regards to goods receiving, rail would be the preferred choice of freight transport. However, due to shutdowns, plants that are offline, etc, road transport has been utilised more than rail.
Normally, rail would be utilised to transport LPG from Sapref in Durban or from PetroSA in Mossel Bay. Rail is utilised by some suppliers to transport propane form Mossel Bay to Port Elizabeth, which then in turn distributes it by road to the various depots or direct to the clients in liquid bulk tankers or vehicles transporting cylinders. The bulk of the goods however originate via sea from undisclosed overseas refineries. Previously, LPG was sourced from Singapore and the coast of Mozambique via transhipment.
Trends in transport method and operation
Gas tankers and all general purpose vehicles carrying gases are required to display “Hazchem” labels with details of the products being conveyed. This is in many instances problematic as there can be 10 different products on the vehicle and the display of “Multiload; Hazchem” labels gives no clues as to which dangerous gases can be anticipated in the event of accidents. LPG tankers are only filled to 85% capacity, due to safety reasons.
Drivers are directed at times, over the festive season to divert via the Langkloof, thereby bypassing Knysna for safety reasons. The question arises what measures are in place in event of spillage with regard to resources, equipment, etc when these vehicles are diverted to these remote areas.
As mentioned, although rail would be the ideal mode of transport, the majority of the land transport is done by road transport due to the fact that not enough rail wagons are allocated to the gas suppliers. This then puts a strain on the road network and suppliers, causing disruptions to traffic flow, time delays, unavailability of liquid bulk tankers, etc.
Future developments
According to the GAS INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT PLANS there are a number of pipelines to be built in terms of the anticipated market developments. Essentially the developments represent 4 main phases, although within each phase, there may be a number of sub-phases: • Phase 1 = the Mozambique/South Africa Transmission Pipeline project. • Phase 2 = the Western Cape Transmission Pipeline • Phase 3 = the Northern Cape to Gauteng transmission Pipeline • Phase 4 = the coastal transmission pipeline
These phases may or may not take place and may or may not be in the order listed above. Such decision will be made on a commercial basis and matching reserves with markets. The East Coast to Durban pipeline is estimated at $550 million with an overall length of 847km. The proposed construction date is 2015 to 2018.
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