Good afternoon. The presidents of Zimbabwe and Botswana flew to the beautiful Maputo province coastline today for a tripartite summit with Mozambican president Filipe Nyusi, regarding the proposed Ponta Techobanine rail-to-port project that would destroy an important nature reserve in the interest of allowing Botswana to export more coal to be burned in Asian power plants. This long-standing plan, which we had believed was all but dead, was apparently revived at — of all places — the COP28 global climate change summit held in the UAE last year. The mind boggles.
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Up in Tete province, not far from the Zimbabwe border, the Cahora Bassa Hydroelectric (HBC) power plant has reported lower production figures due to lower rainfall, connected to the climatic phenomenon of El Niño. How climate change will affect water levels in the great Zambezi river will be a key consideration in HCB’s plans to build its north bank extension, and for Mozambique’s plans to build another megadam, Mphanda Nkuwa, further downstream.
