Eskom Hld SOC Ltd or Eskom is a South African electricity public utility. Eskom was established in 1923 as the Electricity Supply Commission (ESCOM) (Afrikaans: Elektrisiteitsvoorsieningskommissie (EVKOM)). Eskom represents South Africa in the Southern African Power Pool. The utility is the largest producer of electricity in Africa, and was among the top utilities in the world in terms of generation capacity and sales. It is the largest of South Africa's state owned enterprises. Eskom operates a number of notable power stations, including Matimba Power Station and Medupi Power Station in Lephalale, Kusile Power Station in Witbank, Kendal Power Station, and Koeberg Nuclear Power Station in the Western Cape Province, the only nuclear power plant in Africa.
Jagersfontein is a small town in the Free State province of South Africa.
The Williamson Diamond Mine is a diamond mine 23 kilometres (14 mi) northeast of Shinyanga in Tanzania; it became well known as the first significant diamond mine outside of South Africa. The kimberlite pipe was found in March 1940 and the mine established by John Williamson, a Canadian geologist, and has been continuous operation since then, making it one of the oldest continuously operating diamond mines in the world. Over its lifetime it has produced over 19 million carats (3,800 kg) of diamonds. A 2020 report by The Guardian said that high-quality pink diamonds from the mine could value up to $700,000 a carat.
The Excelsior Diamond is a gem-quality diamond, and was the largest known diamond in the world from the time of its discovery in 1893 until 1905, when the Cullinan Diamond was found. It was found on June 30, 1893, at the Jagersfontein Mine in South Africa, 130 kilometres south east of Kimberley whose fame as a diamond mining center always overshadowed that of Jagersfontein. It had a blue-white tint and weighed 971 old carats or 995.2 metric carats. The Excelsior rates as the fourth largest rough diamond of gem quality ever found. It was ultimately cut into ten stones weighing from 13 to 68 carats.
The Premier Mine is an underground diamond mine owned by Petra Diamonds in the town of Cullinan, 40 kilometres (25 mi) east of Pretoria, Gauteng Province, South Africa. Established in 1902, it was renamed the Cullinan Diamond Mine in November 2003 in celebration of its centenary. The mine is a carrot-shaped volcanic pipe and has a surface area of 32 hectares. The mine rose to prominence in 1905, when the Cullinan Diamond – the largest rough diamond of gem quality ever found – was discovered there.
The Kimberley Mine or Tim Kuilmine is an open-pit and underground mine in Kimberley, South Africa, and claimed to be the deepest hole excavated by hand, although this claim is disputed by Jagersfontein.
Reikaeletse Mine is a diamond mine situated in the Free State province, about 80 km from Kimberley, South Africa. It is one of the many Kimberley mines of which Kimberley mine, de Beers mine, Dutoitspan, Bultfontein and Wesselton are its more famous neighbours.
Jagersfontein Mine was an open-pit mine in South Africa, located close to the town of Jagersfontein and about 110 kilometres south-west of Bloemfontein. Since it was first established, two of the ten biggest diamonds ever discovered, the Excelsior and the Reitz, were mined from Jagersfontein. The term "Jagers" has since been coined to denote the distinctive faint bluish tint of the gems from this mine. Among geologists, Jagersfontein is known as a kimberlite pipe, and a prime locality for mantle xenoliths, some of which are believed to have come from depths of 300–500 km (190–310 mi).
A dam failure or dam burst is a catastrophic type of structural failure characterized by the sudden, rapid, and uncontrolled release of impounded water or the likelihood of such an uncontrolled release. Between the years 2000 and 2009 more than 200 notable dam failures happened worldwide.
Mining in South Africa was once the main driving force behind the history and development of Africa's most advanced and richest economy. Large-scale and profitable mining started with the discovery of a diamond on the banks of the Orange River in 1867 by Erasmus Jacobs and the subsequent discovery of the Kimberley pipes a few years later. Gold rushes to Pilgrim's Rest and Barberton were precursors to the biggest discovery of all, the Main Reef/Main Reef Leader on Gerhardus Oosthuizen's farm Langlaagte, Portion C, in 1886, which kicked off the Witwatersrand Gold Rush and the subsequent rapid development of the gold field there.
Samson Gwede Mantashe is a South African politician and former trade unionist. He is the Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy, with the function of Minister of Electricity and Energy having been accorded to Kgosientsho Ramokgopa. Mantashe was Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy from May 2019 to June 2024, and Minister of Mineral Resources from February 2018 to May 2019. He is also serving his second term as the national chairperson of the African National Congress (ANC).
Petra Diamonds Ltd is a diamond mining group headquartered in Jersey. Petra own one of the world's most productive mines historically, the Cullinan Diamond Mine is famed for having produced the world's largest rough and polished diamond. The company is listed on the London Stock Exchange.
The Gupta family is a wealthy and influential business family from India, with close ties to former South African President Jacob Zuma and his administration. The family's most notable members are the brothers Ajay, Atul, and Rajesh "Tony" Gupta—as well as Atul's nephews Varun, and US-based Ashish and Amol.
General elections were held in South Africa on 8 May 2019 to elect a new President, National Assembly and provincial legislatures in each province. These were the sixth elections held since the end of apartheid in 1994 and determined who would become the next President of South Africa.
The structural failure of tailings dams and the ensuing release of toxic metals in the environment is a great concern. The standard of public reporting on tailings dam incidents is poor. A large number remain completely unreported, or lack basic facts when reported. There is no comprehensive database for historic failures. According to mining engineer David M Chambers of the Center for Science in Public Participation, 10,000 years is "a conservative estimate" of how long most tailings dams will need to maintain structural integrity.
South Africa's energy crisis or load shedding is an ongoing period of widespread national blackouts of electricity supply. It began in the later months of 2007 towards the end of Thabo Mbeki's second term as president, and continues to the present. The South African government-owned national power utility, and primary power generator, Eskom, and various parliamentarians attributed these rolling blackouts to insufficient generation capacity.
During the 2019 Easter weekend, the coastal city of Durban, South Africa, experienced severe flooding, caused by torrential rain brought on by a steep upper air trough, which deepened into low pressure in the upper levels of the atmosphere, and impacted the city and its surrounding areas starting 18 April 2019. The floods resulted in at least 70 deaths caused by collapsed buildings, mudslides and sinkholes. It was one of the deadliest disasters to hit the country in the 2010s.
The Judicial Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture, Corruption and Fraud in the Public Sector including Organs of State, better known as the Zondo Commission or State Capture Commission, was a public inquiry established in January 2018 by former President Jacob Zuma to investigate allegations of state capture, corruption, and fraud in the public sector in South Africa.
In April 2022, days of heavy rain across KwaZulu-Natal in southeastern South Africa led to deadly floods. Particularly hard-hit were areas in and around Durban. At least 436 people died across the province, with an unknown number of people missing as of April 22. Several thousand homes were damaged or destroyed. Critical infrastructure, including major roads, transportation, communication, and electrical systems, were also impacted by the flooding, and this damage greatly hampered recovery and relief efforts. It is one of the deadliest disasters in the country in the 21st century, and the deadliest storm since the 1987 floods. The floods have caused more than R17 billion in infrastructure damage. A national state of disaster was declared.
