Name of the Project
Virginia gas project.

Location
The project spans 187 000 ha of gasfields across Welkom, Virginia and Theunissen, in the Free State, South Africa.

Project Owner/s
Tetra4, a subsidiary of Renergen.

Project Description
The project entails the construction of a 52 km gas-gathering pipeline and cryogenic liquefaction processing facilities.

The aim is to produce all South Africa’s helium requirements and potentially export the balance of production, as well as produce the first liquefied natural gas (LNG) locally available for commercial consumption.

Phase 1 aims to produce 350 kg/d of helium and ramp up to 1.2 t/d and 5 t/d of helium in Phase 2.

Additionally, Renergen will concurrently produce up to 10 000 GJ/d of LNG upon reaching full production. This amount of energy is equivalent to 277 000 ℓ/d of diesel.

Should production be maintained, the production right has a remaining life span of about 23 years.

Potential Job Creation
Despite the project’s size relative to traditional mining operations, it will create an estimated 360 temporary jobs during development and construction, and an estimated 82 permanent jobs once all the clusters have been developed.

Capital Expenditure
The total projected capital expenditure to roll out the first phase of production is estimated at R500-million, which includes the cryogenic liquefiers.

Planned Start /End Date
Phase 1 of the Virginia project is expected to start producing LNG and liquid helium by 2021. Phase 2 is expected to start construction in 2022 or 2023.

Latest Developments
Renergen has completed the design of the pipeline at its Virginia gas project, thereby achieving the project’s third milestone.

According to the company’s milestone tracker, the intended date of completion was April 1, with a tolerance level of seven days either way. While this means that the milestone was achieved eight days behind schedule, on April 16, the company still considers this a considerable achievement when taking the current Covid-19 lockdown conditions into account.

This milestone is not considered to be on the critical path for the final completion date and, therefore, Renergen does not expect that missing the intended milestone date will lead to any further delays in the final project completion.

The pipeline is intended to be completed before the liquefiers are delivered in South Africa.

CEO Stefano Marani has said that, based on current circumstances, Renergen has no reason to believe that it is likely to suffer any material delays to the scheduled turn on date.

Key Contracts and Suppliers
MHA Petroleum (helium reserve independent expert report) and VGI (owner’s engineer with regard to the engineering and procurement phase of the project).

Gas gathering work: EPCM Bonisana, a subsidiary of EPCM Holdings (EPC contractor).

Western Shell Cryogenic Equipment (contract to supply the technology and equipment for the plant).

Contact Details for Project Information
Renergen, tel +27 10 045 6000, email info@renergen.co.za or investorrelations@renergen.co.za.