Monday, March 15, 2010

Public Forum on Energy Options for Sabah

18 comments:

Adriel D.K said...

Finally a forum for the public. I hope there be a lot of people going there to give their own proposal, opinion, and well advise :)

Ahmad Rahman said...

Finally a chance for SESB to present the real facts why coal is the best option which are practical, affordable, technically feasible and environmentally compliant. We should not be too naive to believe otherwise as portrayed by these radical and egoistic self proclaimed environmental group which we dont really know what their real motives are. Are they using solar powered car or the ever poluted 4X4 diesel vehicle? Why, because we all have to be practical right. Is it fair for East Coast folks not to have a single large power plant and depending on the West Coast at all time. Isnt it enough proof that the existing biofuels plant are unreliable? Its time for Sabahans to make their own choices based on technical advises and not self proclaimed expert from these so called environmentalist.

John Sikain said...

Agree with Rahman, why we do not look at how to make the coal plant safe rather than totally against it. Are we saying that we disregarding our experts in this field, we dont believe in our own Dept of Environment, everybody else besides us are liars? Why are we suddenly supporting biodiesel, arent they also causing impact to the environment as well as hydro with clearing of forest? Perhaps the best and sensible approach is to mitigate the impact as per guidelines set by our DOE and other panel of experts.

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Unknown said...

Look for Investors or find out more about world bank so to set up lots of Independent Renewable Energy Power Providers.Set them up, Don't just expect from the goverment.

Unknown said...

Considering that if TNB and SESB still going ahead and shove it down our throat without wanting to negotiating , I say, "Go ahead, keep fighting!" Take the fight nationwide, region wide. But at the same time, also prepare plans for alternative energy should they concede.

Unknown said...

Am i the only one here commenting? This is what I come across from PM 1Malaysia blog http://www.1malaysia.com.my/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=a-green-malaysia-for-the-future-4898.html&Itemid=54&lang=en#comments which entitled 'A Green Malaysia for the Future' In which I picked a line here : Firstly, under Budget 2010, a fund amounting to RM1.5 billion will be established by the Government to provide 'soft loans to companies supplying and utilising green technology.'

As to which extend it really provides we will just have to see.

chee wee said...

Mr Ahmad Rahman:
I don't know who you meant by self proclaimed expert, the panel speakers that spoke for green surf are highly qualified, especially Prof Dr Dan,
his an leading expert in the world (google him if you still have any doubt). His report makes far more sense than SESB's so called "real facts".

Unknown said...

Mr Rahman, the public have seen both sides of presentations that afternoon.I am not from any of the NGOs but am concern about Sabah's future considering our resources in the past has not really been well managed and we still have the highest illiteracy rate. Because of work, from time to time I have to live in the remote kampung areas whereby water and electricity is not always accessible (Pulau Banggi). I work with the orang putih as well as the kampung people as my colleagues and I don't look to them as being superior or worship them and they know that very well and respect(some hate)me for that. I don't claim myself to be an expert because those are titles that other to give it to you. My bachelor degree is science degree and took MBA while working and planning to take a MSc in foreseeable future. I don't take what the NGOs said at face value and do think their presentation that day is a bit too emotional and melodramatic. The SESB representative presented his fact like an engineer and technical person. I took the pain to read up articles not from NGO site but online journals what not.

But, the way forward is still using green technology.

As for TNB-SESB to build a 1.8 Billion Ringgit coal plant, is not really that cheap to generate 300MW.

http://www.china-windturbine.com/news/Thailand__wind_power_plant.htm
4.2 Billion Baht equals 400 million Ringgit.

By the Way, I don't own a company or get anything from commenting like this.

One of the public

Unknown said...

Reading this : http://www.china-windturbine.com/news/Thailand__wind_power_plant.htm
I did some mental calculation : the same thing set up here in Sabah with only 10% efficacy (600MW instead of 6GW) and at double the cost mentioned there (8.4 Billion Baht instead of 4.2 Billion Baht), which 8.4 Billion baht is RM
862,320,463.65 (862 million ringgit), it is still cheaper and greener than 1.8 Billion ringgit generating 300MW?

kikilala said...

Eric Coral, are you the guy who talked about wind power plant in Thailand and just walked off during the forum??

Anonymous said...

Wind Power is great, if we have the wind. Base on data, Sabah’s average wind flow is only between 0.3 – 5.4 m/s or 1.08 – 19.4 km/hr. The wind turbines requires a wind speed of 14 m/s or 50.4 km/hr. Yes we can spend RM862mill to build this wind farm, but what happen if there is no wind. Then another power plant is needed to supplement the power needs. Then we said build more biomass plant, SESB is already buying 30MW from them, and more are being build, but we are still hungry for more power. How much more forest is to be cut down to plant this palm oil. Burning of anything will still create Carbon Dioxide, other gases and ash, and it will take 10 times the amount of EFP to Coal to generate the same MW.

Unknown said...

renewable energy is good however careful research is important. Wind energy also faces a lot of problems when it comes to maintenance and long term harvesting energy.

especially those in the sea where high salination causes serious corosion.
Stainless steel seems good solution but when we think of the cost of energy and money to build and maintain... in long term it might not be a very good source.

Unknown said...

Zack, according to American Wind Energy Association "A site must have a minimum annual average wind speed in the neighborhood of 11-13 mph to even be considered." (which is 17.6km/h - 20.8km/h) and if you check Malaysian Meterological Department website http://www.met.gov.my/index.php?option=com_weatheropenseas&Itemid=910&lang=english

Windspeed of 20-30km/h is reported at Sulawesi and Sulu sea.

As for salinity causing erosion and long term might not be good source : Reassure to find this out - Denmark a pioneering country in windpower since 1970's has been installing wind power turbine offshores, as of 2007 wind power produces 3,125MW and accounts for almost 20% of the power generated in Denmark. And the wind turbines are installed out there off shore in the sea exposing to the salinity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_Denmark

As for Denmark's annual windspeed ranges from 19 knots (35.19km/h) to 10 knots (18.52km/h) http://www.windfinder.com/wind-cgi/top_surfspots.pl?mode=statistic&country=dk

We will just have to wait for the wind report to come out and given what I remember about the SESB presentation they did not quote where they got they findings about East coast of Land Below the Wind being windless, I would like to read the published paper from which ever journal they quoted. If you talk about west malaysia being windless, yes I have read papers about it and can understand that but there are also places with feasible wind power like Pulau Perhentian having their own wind power plant generating 300kw for their community.


Sorry to have to walked off but I really don't see how the squable will be resolved , I proposed to SESB 'give the customer what they want - green energy' - and sadly, don't think the monopolist TNB-SESB will change their mind. The TNB and SESB has been bashed so badly and I don't think there is any chance of them and the Green Surf working together. If I am you guys, the Green SURF - let's start thinking of getting investors and technical expertise and work with goverment to set up independent power plants that supply to the needs of East Coast so that they don't have to buy electricity from SESB.

Unknown said...

If you guys are serious about Green energy, you will have to put your heads together and help solve the black out problem in East Coast, like Ghandi that I quoted "You can't curse the darkness and wish it to go away, you have to light a match (or LED in the new green context)" Right now, TNB-SESB , no matter how much they are being critized - are burning candles made out of coal and they have PLANS, what are you guys doing?

Fighting alone not going to solve the problem. If they do go ahead and build one and Najib says something like 'it will only be decomissioned once renewable energy is able to cater to more than 50% of nation energy consumption', what you going to do? Take them to Interpol for environmental crime (there is such a thing) which again will further strain the now open relationship between goverment and NGOs?

My proposal to Green SURF - look for investor and entrepreneurs and aliase them with people with espertise on renewable energy. Take the initiative and contact Vestas Wind Systems (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vestas), or may be some solar company in China which produces quality cost effect panels and talk and work with goverment about allowing independent power plants to be set up.

Again, as I mentioned earlier on - I do not get a out of all these though I hope I could.

Anonymous said...

Eric, Sabah is claim to have insufficient power that cause blackouts, so build us this wind and solar power so that we can have sufficient power. But I ask you can we have 24 hours of power from the sun? What happen when there is not enough wind speed to turn the turbine. What then......blackout again! It might be ok for Denmark has builds up to 20% of wind RE power, but what is their total available generating power, will they have enough fossil or Nuclear plant to cover the demand if there is not wind. I agree that we need to go Green but only if this can guarantee that I will have 24 hours a day of uninterrupted supply.

Unknown said...

If we are going to look at blackout, we seriously have to look at what causes it. TNB last year alone made RM780 million on top of that their CEO got the award for Asia CEO of the Year recently and all these while east coast Sabah suffering black out. And if you remember their presentation , the coal plant will take 3 years to be fully operational whiles wind power only 6 to 12 months. Like the professor said , it is a package and biomass, fossil fuel, solar ,wind or new fossil fuel generators can go hand in hand together. But, if it comes to the point that coal is the only practical solution and the necessary evil : what to do? But on health and environmental ground if there is rise of pollution and cases of breathing related diseases in community and especially new born babies shots up adjacent area (which I hope is being monitored), the coal plant has to be decommisioned imediately. There are ways to generate electricity without coal. Australia is the biggest coal exporter in the world but they themselves also build wind farms and solar power plant and targeting to depend more and more of their energy on renewable energy sources. Coal plant - the green house gases and pollutants is what is going against coal plant.

Unknown said...

http://www.nrdc.org/health/effects/fasthma.asp