The Ministry of Environmental Affairs last week halted preparations by the French cement company Lafarge to build storage units for fuel coke in Egypt until the ministry had made a decision regarding the use of coal instead of natural gas for cement factories. Coke is a solid fuel derived from coal after the removal of volatile material. The ministry said that it had received a study that evaluated the environmental impact of using coal at Lafarge factories in May 2013, but it was postponing its decision until it had got approval from the Supreme Council for Energy. At the end of 2013, it was found that the cement maker had started building coal-storage silos without approval from the ministry. Minister of Trade and Industry Mounir Fakhri Abdel-Nour said recently that local supplies of oil and gas were currently insufficient to cover the needs of industry and household consumption. He said that the government was discussing permitting cement companies to use coal, but that the Environment and Tourism Ministries opposed this. The government's direction towards using coal as an alternative to natural gas for cement factories has stirred debate. Its move came in a bid to address the energy shortages that prompted cement and other energy-intensive industries to cut back on their production, their having complained that they have not been able to work at full capacity because of gas shortages. As a result, the companies have petitioned the government to be allowed to use coal as an alternative source of energy to run the factories. Last year, energy shortages cost the cement industry in Egypt a loss of some 20 per cent (3.7 metric tonnes) in production capacity. Although it might be a solution, the use of coal does not make everyone happy. A number of civil society groups and NGOs have launched a campaign called “Egyptians Against Coal” in order to rally support against government plans to import coal, citing coal's harmful impact on the economy and health. “The struggle against coal is a struggle for our social and economic rights, a struggle for sustainable energy, and a struggle against the violation of human rights in favour of big companies,” reads the campaign's Facebook page, which has around 2,500 members. According to the page, the campaign was launched in November 2013 after a coal shipment arrived in Alexandria illegally. The campaign, along with other environmental organisations and NGOs, has supported the decision of the Ministry of Environmental Affairs against Lafarge, describing the decision as “daring”. In a press statement on Sunday, the organisations expressed their concern at the government's tendency to see coal as an alternative source of energy, saying that such a move would benefit a small number of investors who were seeking maximum profits and ignoring the economic, health and environmental consequences of their decision. The organisations added that the use of coal would cause severe pollution to the environment and bring serious dangers to health. However, the negative effects of using coal could be mitigated, according to Dina Al-Kayali, a market research consultant at Edge for Training and Consultancy, a firm which gives business development advice to different sectors including cement. She said coal was used as a source of energy all over the world and that it was needed because energy was no longer as cheap as it used to be. “The government should not ban using coal. Instead, it should put stringent measures in place to control the effects consequent on using it,” Al-Kayali told Al-Ahram Weekly. According to Al-Kayali, using coal is a solution, at least a temporary one, to the country's energy problems. Cement companies would not mind converting to other sources of energy, such as renewable energy, she said, but this would take time and the factories needed energy now. She also said that the government should encourage cement firms to invest in renewable energy through giving them incentives. Al-Kayali said that the use of coal in cement factories instead of natural gas would save large quantities of natural gas that could go to other uses. According to a study conducted by the state-owned Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS), the use of coal instead of natural gas in cement factories would save some 500 million cubic feet per day. The study added that what distinguished coal from other conventional sources of energy was that it was available in many parts of the world at relatively cheap prices. Coal was used in more than 24 countries across the globe, it said. The cement industry consumes nine per cent of the total amount of natural gas produced in Egypt, coming in third place after the electricity and fertiliser sectors. “The issue is not about using coal, but about the measures the government will put in place to monitor the companies should they use coal,” Al-Kayali said. She pointed out that there were 20 cement factories in Egypt that could be closely monitored by the government, adding that “investors are willing to follow the regulations”. Al-Kayali said that the government could impose hefty penalties on factories that did not follow the regulations, noting that this happened elsewhere in the world. She stated that despite the fact that the cement factories were now using natural gas, there was a lot of pollution in the areas where these factories were located. “Our problem is that we have the needed measures, but they are not enforced,” Al-Kayali said. Although the government has recently allowed energy-intensive industries to import natural gas independently for the first time in a bid to redress energy shortages, companies could be reluctant to import such gas because it would be expensive. Al-Kayali said that the higher price and complexity of the process of importing natural gas would push cement factories to prefer using coal to address their energy shortages. The cement industry was one of the key industries in Egypt that contributed to the country's production and exports, she said, and as a result of the critical juncture the country was passing through “the government should not hamper this industry”.
