Sabahans’ Petition No.7 – Sabah Does Not Need Coal Power Plants
Author chchung,Apr 20, 2009 11:18:45 am
(Translated from Chinese, original article found at the bottom of this page and at:
http://www.merdekareview.com/reader_view.php?id=8697)
My view is in response to “State Government kowtow to interests, Johor’s environmental quality deteriorating”
Lately I had a chat with friends who are concerned with Sabah’s affairs, we decided to initiate a Policy and Governance Petition addressed to those in power at the Federal or State level, which puts Sabahans at the centre, transcending political, racial and religoius backgrounds.
We demand that the present government follows, respect and obey the will of the people; we demand this to be the basis upon which we elect our future government; we demand future governments use this as the guideline in governance.
The Petition shall, over time, be discussed, absorb (other views), be written and put forward. We invite the public to help in giving suggestions and in discussions, as well as to convey the Petitions to broader audience.
The Stand Against Coal Power Plants
16/4 /2009?during my free time after official business in Sandakan, I met with my friends from the Sabah Environment Protection Association, SEPA, Sandakan Chapter, and from the Sandakan Anti-Coal Power Plant Committee. I wish to express my support towards their stand to oppose the construction of any coal power plant anywhere in Sabah, and also towards those 40,000 Sabahans who have joined the Signature Campaign to oppose the coal power plant.
Background
Sabah’s normal daily electricity need is 650MW.
Sabah’s existing electricity-generating capacity is 770MW.
In Sabah, power cuts is part of daily life, especially in the East Coast towns of Tawau, Sandakan and Lahad Datu. SESB has recently announced that the “system average interruption duration index, SAIDI” in Sabah has decreased from about 4000 minutes per year in 2006 to currently 1000 minutes per year (17 hours per year).
What is the problem with interruptions to electricity supply? The official explanations are usually along the lines of: technical problems in Independent Power Plants; hydro-power plants suspend operation due to rising water levels; breakdowns of aging power transmission station ; transmission lines stolen; reduction in supplies and system instability due to theft of electricity by illegally and rampantly erected wooden houses across the State. In reality, overwhelming majority of the problems occurred within the distribution system?(distance of within 10km radius), and not inter-regional transmission system (transmission distance of more than 10km).
3/4/2008?the Chief Minister of Sabah announced that the proposal to build a 300MW coal power plant in Lahad Datu was rejected. At that time, the Chief Minister announced in the newspaper,
“We do not want to risk the welfare and health of the communities in the area [in Lahad Datu] as well as any adverse impact on the environment… I know some say with today’s technology, the proposed plant is safe and clean but some experts also disagree.”
Yet very soon thereafter, these people proposed to build the coal power plant in Sandakan, which was met with unexpectedly strong objection. But this time, the State Government still has not made any decision after prolonged delay (unlike in Lahad Datu). The Chairman of Tenaga Nasional Berhad and former Minister for Energy (Federal) even advertised in the newspapers, to demand that those who are against the coal power plant should be held responsible for the energy shortage problem which shall be faced by Sabaha very soon, due to the rejection of the coal power plant.
The reality is, who dares to claim that because of ‘clean coal technology’, coal burning for electricity generation is therefore a clean source of energy? The answer is NO! Many groups with vested political interests have their ‘hired-guns’ and campaigners trying to divert the attention and to attack these environmentalists personally, to criticize these environmentalists that they, for the sake of their personal preferences/hobbides, are anti-development, to the extent of denying the developmental opportunities of others. They claim that these environmentalists are hypocrites, because the cars they drive equally pollute. I hope more people would come out to expose these defective and inferior methods, which only attempt to blur the focus, to resort to personal attacks, to turn wrong into right, and are basically nonsense.
The ‘conspiracy theory’ circling among the people is that: Coal-using groups have lobbied TNB and Petronas that if Petronas sell the cheaper energy sources (such as petroleum and natural gas) to advanced countries such as Japan, then Petronas does not have to sell these energy sources to TNB (or SESB or Independent Power Plants) for energy production. Therefore, Petronas can share the additional profits or money ‘saved’ from this approach with TNB. Of course, after generating more profits for TNB, coal-using groups hope to make their own money from the sale of coal, as well as to get better prices in the power purchase agreement, PPA, for coal power plants.
The coal power plants are all proposed to be in the scale of hundreds of MW, firstly to let Petronas see the bigger scale of the ‘savings’, and secondly, the capacity payment in the PPA, regardless of whether SESB buy the power from the Independent Power Plants or not (note: for electricity meters, you pay for what you actually use), this amount of money must be paid.
So, the environment and the people of Sabah are placed in a completely passive position. Hopefully there is no problem; but if problems occur, who is going to be responsible?
In debating this topic, we should focus on the following important points:
Point 1 – In early 2008, SESB widely publicized the fact that, after a huge investment, the West-East Power Transmission Grid Line has been completed. At that time, the purpose of constructing this Gride Line is to resolve the problems once and for all by transmitting the excess power supply in the West Coast (Kota Kinabalu) to the East Coast (Tawau and Sandakan).
Yet today, some groups with vested interests have – shamelessly – claimed that to transmit electricity from the West Coast to the East by using a 300 km long transmission line will result in excessive level of ‘transmission loss’. This self-contradiction lies at the heart of the whole debate.
If the transmission of electricity from the West Coast to the East will result in excessive level of ‘transmission loss’, then what about those transmission lines which are thousands of km long in the USA and Canada?
If that is the case, are they saying that when the proposed 300MW coal power plant in Sandakan transmits power to outside Sandakan, there will be NO FEAR of excessive level of ‘transmission loss’?
And what about the transmission of power from Bakun Dam, Sarawak, to Peninsular Malaysia by using UNDER-SEA cable (note: more than 670km long, roughly DOUBLE the distance of the Sabah West-East Grid Line) – why is the level of ‘transmission loss’ acceptable, then? And why is it not OK to transmit some of that electricity from Bakun, Sarawak, to the East Coast of Sabah?
Point 2 – If Sabah does not use imported coal for power-generation, there will be no other alternative? There are other alternatives – what about hydro, solar, wind, petrol, natural gas and biomass?
The offshore of the West Coast of Sabah produces huge amount of natural gas. But presently, it has been decided that the natural gas produced in Sabah shall be exported to Bintulu, Sarawak. The pipeline for transporting the natural gas costs a fortune to construct.
We have a clean source of energy, but why should it be exported to another state? And turn it into Liquified Natural Gas, and export to Japan for THEIR power-generation? In return, we generate our electricity using IMPORTED, DIRTY coal!
Isn’t this very IRONIC and ILLOGICAL? Why can’t we generate the electricity in Kimanis, West Coast, and then transmit the electricity to the East Coast which is only 300 km away by using Grid Line?
The oil palm produced in Sabah is 1/3 of the national production volume, which is also 1/10 of the global production volume. The 120 or so palm oil mills in Sabah produce 5 million tons of empty fruit bunch, EFB? which could theoretically produce 400 MW of electricity, and fulfils the Clean Development Mechanism? CDM, under the United Nations Framework for Climate Change Convention, UNFCCC.
Point 3 – A unique heritage of Sabah is its historical background. Sabah was called North Borneo, and we have unique advantages for our Tourism industry. Sabah is not highly industrialized, but this ‘disadvantage’ must become the advantage for Sabah’s eco-tourism. Sabah has Kinabalu Park, which enjoys the status as a World Heritage site; we have the Sipadan Island, 1 of the top 10 diving heavens in the world; we also have many beautiful islands, the world’s only and largest Orang Utan Rehabilitation Centre (note: only less than 10 km from the proposed coal power plant site in Seguntor, Sandakan); we have the world-renowned ‘the Lost World’ of Maliau Basin, the world’s foremost Rainforest Research Centre in Danum Valley, and we are also 1 of the world’s top 10 mega bio-diversity sites.
But are these precious reasons sufficient to persuade the Sabah State Government that we should not, for the sake of a mere few MW of electricity, destroy all these unique, precious competitive advantages of Sabah?
We therefore petition for the following:
1. Sabah State Government should, instead of delaying and procrastinating, immediately reject the coal power plant proposal. As to the use of coal power on a smaller scale through the backdoor by some, the State Government should immediately prohibit. The State Government should immediately legislate to declare Sabah’s conviction in insisting on the use of clean energy sources.
The State Government should resist the lobbying by SESB, TNB, and groups and politicians with vested interests who have tried to bend the truth and confuse the public. We must use the clean sources of energy available in Sabah for our electricity-generation.
2. Safeguard the only available and surviving competitive advantage of Sabah – the natural environment and eco-resources must be preserved for future generations.
3. The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission or the Public Accounts Committee of the Parliament should immediately investigate the above-mentioned ‘conspiracy theory’; whether the people’s basic interests are being invaded because of the individual self-interests of the few?
The author’s blog is http://chinhing.blogspot.com/
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