Sustainable Development

The window of opportunity to keep the average global temperature from breaking through the ceiling of 2°C — or preferably 1.5°C — as set out in the UN’s Paris Agreement is closing fast.

Major climate impacts and exorbitant costs have sounded the death knell for one of the last new proposed coal-fired power stations in South Africa: Thabametsi in water-scarce Limpopo.

The struggle to preserve this resource for residents of the Cape Flats to farm and feed themselves is about protecting it from development and nurturing the richness it offers.

The South African government still needs to drawing up a just transition plan that will support workers who are likely to lose their jobs as the country moves its economy away from dependence on carbon-emitting production, such as mining and downstream industries.

With findings that neither the City of Cape Town nor the provincial government considered the full impact of development on the Cape Flats Aquifer in the Philippi Horticultural Area, the Cape High Court has sent two crucial decisions back for a second look.

The environmental justice group, South Durban Community Environmental Alliance, has launched a lawsuit against resin manufacturing company Safripol. Thousands of Wentworth residents found their health seriously compromised after a chemical fire at the refinery.

During September, South Africa’s youth infotainment show, Politically Aweh, in partnership with Action 24 – Active Citizens for Responsive Legislatures, launched a video series on the climate crisis in Mzansi. With the recent femicides that shook the nation to xenophobic attacks and an unemployment rate of 29%, it’s understandably challenging for young South Africans to even think about climate change. However, as Goldman Environmental prize winner, activist and HBF partner Makoma Lekalakala points out in the video “You cannot have jobs on a dead planet.”