Shanghai, China - 
A South African energy company is strengthening its partnership with Chinese hydrogen technology company, REFIRE, as it seeks to commercialise locally developed fuel-cell technology and expand South Africa’s hydrogen economy.
Bambili Energy and HyPlat Chief Executive Officer, Zanele Mavuso- Mbatha, said the partnership would combine the companies’ expertise to develop projects in South Africa and take promising technology beyond the demonstration stage.
“We are proud of our partnership with REFIRE, which has brought us here to Shanghai,” Mavuso-Mbatha said during a site visit with South African government officials in Shanghai, China recently.
“The partnership is really about how we can jointly pursue the commercial scale-up of our business and work together on projects of mutual benefit as we roll out the hydrogen economy in South Africa.”
REFIRE, headquartered in Shanghai, develops and manufactures hydrogen fuel-cell technologies, including systems used in commercial vehicles. Bambili produces modular fuel-cell systems in South Africa for applications ranging from backup and off-grid electricity to large-scale power generation. Bambili said its systems can provide between 5kW and grid-scale power.
A journey into green energy
Mavuso-Mbatha entered the hydrogen sector through her experience in platinum mining and her concern that South Africa was exporting much of its mineral wealth without capturing its full value.
“The latest career shift began in my former life, when I ran a platinum-mining company. I noticed that we were exporting almost 90% of the platinum, or platinum-group metals, from South Africa. They were being beneficiated and turned into high-value products in other parts of the world,” she said.
“I became very passionate about making sure that we use platinum – because South Africa has more than 80% of the world’s platinum – to beneficiate it and manufacture high-value products in South Africa.”
This led her to membrane electrode assemblies, a key component of technology that uses hydrogen to produce clean electricity. The South African-developed innovation created an opportunity to turn locally mined platinum into a high-value product for the clean-energy sector.
“I therefore became very interested in ensuring that we achieve the commercial scale-up of this technology in South Africa.”
Bambili was established in 2018. According to Mavuso-Mbatha, government investment played an important role in developing the underlying technology, while Bambili assumed responsibility for taking it towards commercial production.
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