Andrew Forrest’s flip on undersea power cables to spruik Moroccan energy

Andrew Forrest and Caroline Kennedy attend the TIME100 Gala in New York on April 24. Picture: Getty Images

Clearly reinvigorated by his anointment as one of Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people, Andrew Forrest is back selling a big dream.

This time it’s the prospect of running a 4000km cable from Morocco to solve all of the UK’s future energy needs, as told to The Telegraph last week.

Forrest told the paper that he’d held discussions with UK Energy Secretary Ed Miliband seeking support to buy baseload power from Fortescue’s (as yet unbuilt) portfolio of renewable projects in North Africa.

This is the same Andrew Forrest that was planning on supplying the UK with 1.5 million tonnes of green hydrogen a year, under a deal done with construction giant JCB back in the heady days of the hydrogen hype in 2021.

Fortescue, readers may recall, entered Morocco about a year ago in a deal with state-owned OCP Group promising to use Morocco’s boundless sun and wind to produce green hydrogen, ammonia, and fertilisers for supply to Morocco, Europe and international markets.

That deal, as with so many other things, seems to have vanished without trace into the black hole at the centre of Fortescue’s energy division.

And Forrest, to be fair, pivoted to the subsea cable idea within months of his deal with OCP, bringing in Belgian-cable layer Jan De Nul Group as a partner in June last year.

But isn’t this also the same Andrew Forrest that notoriously fell out with Mike Cannon-Brookes over the Sun Cable project in the Northern Territory?

Oddly enough, that was over Cannon-Brookes’ desire to sell power from the giant renewable energy project to Singapore, via an undersea cable.

Which would never work, Forrest said at the time, because of the risk of running a long cable through the territorial waters of multiple countries.

“Cables are fantastic, but at shorter distance and through very friendly waters. Because cables are exposed,” Forrest said at the time.

For the record, Sun Cable planned a 4200km subsea cable to Singapore. Fortescue, of course, hasn’t detailed its plans for Moroccan power. But those of a rival proponent, Xlinks, run to 4000km.

It’s the extra 200km that makes all the difference, no doubt.

And as for sovereign risk? Well, let’s not worry about all of those allegations about Russia’s cable-cutting vessels in the Baltic.

Forrest also yanked his involvement in Sun Cable because of the cost – at last sight, some $35bn. The cost of Xlinks’ cable from Morocco to Europe and the UK? About $51bn.

UK Energy Minister Ed Miliband with Moroccan Energy Minister Leila Benali in London. Picture: Picture: UK government

But Margin Call was fascinated to notice who else was in London in late April talking up Morocco’s energy supply ambitions. Who else but Moroccan energy minister Leila Benali, famously linked to a quick pash with Forrest in Paris almost a year ago – an affair she denies (sort of).

Benali also met with Miliband at the Summit of the Future of Energy Security put on by the UK Energy Secretary and the International Energy Agency in late April. As did IEA president Fatih Birol, last seen in these pages penning the ode to Forrest published by Time magazine.

Sadly, it doesn’t appear that the pair crossed paths in London. Forrest appears to have been in New York as Benali spoke to Miliband, escorting Caroline Kennedy to Time’s do celebrating their 100 most influential people of the year.

C-suite chaos

Has there ever been a more cack-handed process to recruit a CEO of a major ASX-listed company than at South32?

Sure, Richard Goyder has had a few moments – at Woodside, Qantas and the AFL

But South32 chair Karen Wood seems to be setting new standards as the firm’s on-again, off-again search for a replacement for Graham Kerr results in the appointment of … a deputy CEO.

After poaching Anglo American executive Matthew Daley for the top job, the company will wait nine months for him to start. In the role of deputy chief executive. This is the company that was interviewing candidates for the role in late 2023, but unaccountably yanked up the process and stuck with Kerr. Then, seemingly, started again.

Incoming South32 chief executive Matthew Daley.

But apparently the board didn’t trust the process enough to simply hand Daley the job from the first day – he has to run with training wheels for an ill-defined period before actually taking over from Kerr. It is, frankly, bizarre.

There’s no issue with Anglo requiring a period of gardening leave before Daley is allowed to start his new job. The two companies have shared assets, and are competing in the same market for growth opportunities.

And there’s plenty of precedent. Andrew Mackenzie, famously, had to twiddle his thumbs for a year after defecting from Rio Tinto to BHP. He spent the time learning to speak Spanish.

There’s also plenty of precedent for bringing in a potential CEO into an executive role as part of the process – Mackenzie again being a good example, or Nev Power at Fortescue, or Jean Sebastien Jacques at Rio. Though maybe that last isn’t the best argument for the concept.

Alternatively, you recruit an external candidate and shuffle the incumbent out the door quick-sharp, to allow the new boss a clean run from the start.

But nobody – except South32, clearly – announces an external candidate nine months out, then doesn’t even give them the top job when they get there. Now the company is left with a lame-duck boss for as much as a year. Or God forbid the surely remote prospect that Daley isn’t up to snuff, in which case we begin again.

Good sense prevails

Reason appears to have broken out over at Energy Resources of Australia, after Margin Call pointed out the colossal waste of time and money about to occur in the Federal Court this week.

ERA’s trial arguing that the Northern Territory and federal governments should not have stripped away its Jabiluka mining leases was set to kick off on Monday, at the risk of having Rio pull the plug on the case after it was heard. But rather than waste a week’s worth of the Federal Court’s time, ERA chose the better part of valour on Monday and asked Justice Geoffrey Kennett to vacate the hearing until a future date – which may never occur. Mind you, a large portion of the costs have already been incurred. ERA, both governments and assorted third parties have already prepared briefs and submissions.

And, although high-priced lawyers won’t now be required to sit in court all week awaiting their turn to speak, they’ll no doubt want at least part of their expected fees to be paid anyway. That’s a matter still be to determined.

However, as Justice Kennett noted in his orders putting off the case until at least June 9 – after Rio is expected to take full control of ERA.

“Costs to be reserved,” he sniffed.