Diesel flowed through Transnet's new multi-product pipeline
(NMPP) from Durban to Heidelberg for the first time on Wednesday. “We
are now able to concurrently run the Durban to Johannesburg pipeline and
the NMPP with petroleum products that will see some three million
litres per hour... flowing between Durban and Johannesburg every week,”
Transnet group CEO Brian Molefe told reporters. He then turned a valve
linked to the NMPP to show it was carrying fuel.

The diesel took a week to travel 555km, from the Durban port to the
Jameson Park inland terminal in Heidelberg, at a speed of six to seven
kilometres an hour. The 24-inch pipeline passes through three pump
stations - all now completed - and over the Drakensberg escarpment. A
network of 16-inch pipes linking to the bigger pipeline had also been
completed, Molefe said. The entire R23.4 billion NMPP will be finished
when the two terminals are complete. A terminal at Jameson Park and
another at Island View in the port of Durban would be completed within
the next 18 months. Once complete, the pipeline would be able to
transport petrol, diesel, jet fuel and gas. - Sapa