06 Oct 2024

Botala Energy, a company focusing on exploration and development opportunities for natural gas and renewables has vowed to augment Botswana’s energy supply.
Botala Energy CEO, Mr Kris Martinick told BOPA in an interview that the company had discovered a Methane source that would augment other forms of energy in the country.
He said they extracted such a gas, which was primarily used for electricity generation, heating and cooking at one of their gas wells at Sandveld ranches.
Furthermore, he said such a move would position the country to compete in the global market for production of coal generated electricity and natural gas, adding that Botswana had been importing electricity from South Africa to alleviate shortage.
Mr Martinick pointed out that it was imperative for the country to be self-sufficient in electricity generation, noting that his company had made a leap forward in ensuring that the country would produce enough to boost supply and consequently meet the national demand for electricity.  
He said his vision was to see Botswana being self-sufficient in electricity generation, adding that the company had already registered at the Botswana Stock Exchange, where he envisioned a positive outcome. 
He shared that Botala Energy’s mission was to enable a successful, secure and sustainable energy future for Botswana that would unlock new economic opportunities.
Established in 2018, the company is currently exploring and developing the Serowe Gas Project and solar opportunities within Botswana.
He narrated that their current operations were centred around Coal Bed Methane (CBM) projects with the potential for more existing opportunities within renewable energies in the future.
Moreover, he said their development and growth would ideally have many positive social, environmental and economic benefits for the nation such as increasing the supply and reliability of Botswana’s energy supply, reducing the cost of domestic electricity, reducing and ideally removing the need for Botswana to import energy and creating a revenue stream through the exportation of cleaner electricity and sale of gas.
For his part, the company’s exploration manager Mr Peter Grant said they had seven mining licenses of Coal Bed Methane Gas (CBM) in central Kalahari Karoo Basin in the north eastern Botswana.
He said such mining licenses gave them mining rights for 420 000 hectares, and therefore managed to drill seven gas wells of CBM pilot project while the other four were for demonstration purposes.
Mr Grant said this unconventional form of natural gas found in coal deposits or seams was buried 350 metres underground, whose deposits dated a million years back.

He said his company was looking into establishing a gas processing plant in Serowe to boost electricity supply and cooking gas commonly known as liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). 
He said such a move would also create employment opportunities for Batswana and grow the country’s economy. End