Nafasi Water Technologies and the Industrial Development Corporation have opened a waste sludge processing facility at the Highveld Industrial Park in eMalahleni, converting a by-product of mine water treatment into chemical inputs for fertiliser production.
The plant forms part of a R60m joint venture in which the IDC acts as both funder and equity partner, positioning itself for a long-term stake in the business rather than a once-off grant or loan. It sits close to Nafasi’s existing mine water treatment operations in Mpumalanga, giving the facility direct access to the waste sludge it needs as feedstock.
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The venture addresses two problems at once. Mpumalanga hosts the bulk of South Africa’s coal mining activity, and mine-impacted water there has been a persistent environmental liability, requiring costly treatment before it can be safely released or reused.
The Council for Geoscience has previously estimated the cost of rehabilitating the country’s derelict and high-risk mine sites at around R60bn, with acid mine drainage in the eMalahleni and Witwatersrand areas singled out as serious enough to prompt cabinet intervention. Rather than treating the resulting sludge purely as a disposal cost, the new facility processes it into commercially saleable material, reducing landfill volumes while creating a product with market value.
That product speaks to the second problem: South Africa’s reliance on imported fertiliser. The country imported more than a billion dollars worth of fertiliser in 2025, with nitrogen-based products alone accounting for well over half of import value in recent years, according to industry body Fertasa. IDC divisional executive Rian Coetzee has linked the project explicitly to that exposure, noting that global fertiliser supply chains were disrupted by the war in Ukraine and that projects capable of substituting imports carry added strategic weight.
| Indicator | Figure |
|---|---|
| Joint venture value | R60m |
| Estimated mine rehabilitation cost, nationally | Around R60bn |
| Derelict or ownerless mines identified | Nearly 6,000, with 1,730 classed high risk |
| South Africa’s 2025 fertiliser import bill | Approximately $1.14bn |
| Nitrogen fertiliser share of import value | Above 55% |
| Water reclaimed by Nafasi to date | More than 100 billion litres |
Nafasi’s involvement builds on roughly two decades of mine water treatment work in the region, including plants at eMalahleni, Middelburg and the former Optimum Coal operation, now run under South32. The company, formerly known as Aveng Water before a 2019 rebrand and full transfer to black-owned investment vehicle Infinity Partners, says it has reclaimed more than 100 billion litres of mining-impacted water across its projects to date.
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It has also recently taken on public-private partnership work, including a water treatment plant at Seriti Resources’ closed Arnot colliery near Middelburg, reflecting a broader shift from single-client contracts toward infrastructure it develops, finances and operates on a long-term basis.
The eMalahleni facility follows a funding round in April, when Nafasi secured investment from Norwegian development finance institution Norfund alongside a follow-on commitment from existing shareholder E Squared Investments.
That capital was earmarked for expanding mine water treatment work and developing technology to recover valuable products from treatment waste, of which the new sludge facility is an early output. Nafasi has said it intends to keep developing methods to extract additional chemicals directly from mine-impacted water, and views the eMalahleni model as replicable in other coal and mineral mining regions facing similar waste and water security pressures.