He was an employee of a petroleum parastatal until his retrenchment in 2022. Now he is leading a company that hopes to support the government in turning South Africa from a net importer of oil and gas into a producer of more than 350,000 barrels per day and export powerhouse.
NetOil Green Energy COO Stephen Ncala said the company plans to support the PetroSA group of companies, with projects to help refurbish local refineries, improve logistical capacity to move products and even take over vacant fuel service stations, among others.
NetOil Green Energy was proposing a special purpose vehicle managed by Orkela Energy director and former partner of Fuelex, Rufus Kalidheen, to spearhead a more than $10bn (R182bn) flagship refinery project in the Richards Bay Industrial Development Zone, Ncala said.
Orkela Energy is an offshoot of NetOil. “This project, already advancing with government collaboration and investor confidence, is poised to transform South Africa’s energy resilience. NetOil Green Energy stands ready to finalise partnerships and commence construction, delivering a zero-carbon, AI-driven refinery that bridges the refining gap, while championing sustainability and inclusive growth.”
The project leverages 3,000 acres of land with robust synergies for import-export efficiency. Key features include cutting-edge emission controls for near-zero carbon output, modular prefabrication, AI-driven construction, as well as carbon capture and storage.
The issue that keeps me up at night is the gas cliff. Yes, it’s upon us and if we don’t do anything of significance in the next two years or so, it has the potential of wiping out 5% of the country’s GDP and upwards of 120,000 direct jobs that are supported by gas
— Kgosientsho Ramokgopa, minister for electricity & energy
Ncala said South Africa’s energy landscape had been severely affected by the closure of critical refineries, resulting in a combined loss of 350,000 barrels a day, with Sapref losing 180,000 barrels a day of capacity, Enref 120,000 barrels a day and PetroSA’s Gas-to-Liquids Refinery 50,000 barrels a day.
“Normally, the modulated refineries come at a capacity where a single train could carry about 150,000 barrels. So, for us wanting to bring 300,000, we could bring two trains and there would also be an opportunity for another train to take it to 450,000.”
NetOil is an international oil company owned by prominent oil and gas dynamo Roger Timraz. Among its accomplishments is the development of the Suez pipeline in Egypt in 1973.
Ncala said the country had become a net importer of fuels after shutting down the three refineries. NetOil was looking to bring products online for PetroSA, but that project never got off the ground, probably due to costs. NetOil has been watching with keen interest after the Central Energy Fund bought the Sapref refinery in Durban and started working to revive it to a capacity of 400,000 barrels.
“We also wanted to come in with them because as NetOil we have a lot of expertise such as getting process plants which are basically prefabricated, modular pieces of equipment. What that does is it speeds up project implementation.”
Minister for electricity & energy Kgosientsho Ramokgopa said South Africa still faced a gas cliff and that this was one of the many economic pitfalls that kept him up at night. He said the government was working with Sasol and Eskom to approach Qatar for 180 petajoules of gas per annum.
“The issue that keeps me up at night is the gas cliff. Yes, it’s upon us and if we don’t do anything of significance in the next two years or so, it has the potential of wiping out 5% of the country’s GDP and upwards of 120,000 direct jobs that are supported by gas,” he said.
Mineral and petroleum resources minister Gwede Mantashe is scheduled to brief parliament on Wednesday on the state of the gas industry and gas exploitation in the country as well as how South Africa hoped to address the gas cliff.
Business Times sent questions to PetroSA seeking an update on its refinery activities, but did not respond before the print deadline.
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