Singapore to import electricity from Malaysia, tap solar power more

The little red dot wants a greener energy mix, and is taking multiple steps to achieve this - from an electricity import pilot with Malaysia, to soaking up more sunshine at home and investing in research on emerging low carbon technologies.

Minister for Trade and Industry Chan Chun Sing yesterday laid out the steps that Singapore will take to become a "bright green spark" - where ideas and applications can help to create more sustainable living environments.

REGIONAL POWER GRIDS

• For one thing, Singapore hopes to tap green energy from around the region through regional power grids.

The groundwork for this will be laid through an electricity import trial with Malaysia over two years.

"We will kick this off by importing 100MW of electricity over a trial period of two years," said Mr Chan at the opening of the Singapore International Energy Week (SIEW), an energy conference.

This will make up about 1.5 per cent of Singapore's peak electricity demand.

"This will allow the region to share the green energy sources that different countries may have," he added.

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SOLAR POWER

• The Republic will also ramp up its drive to tap more sunshine here, with a goal of achieving 1.5 gigawatt-peak (GWp) of solar deployment by 2025.

This will meet about 2 per cent of Singapore's energy demand in 2025, an acceleration of the solar deployment plan that Mr Chan announced at last year's conference.

This means solar panels installed on unused land and rooftops, or floating on bodies of water may soon become a common sight.

The nation's first floating and stacked energy storage system, on Keppel Offshore & Marine's Floating Living Lab, an upcoming offshore test bed, is expected to be up and running in 2023.Clean energy solutions provider Sunseap will also be building Singapore's largest offshore floating solar panel systems north along the Strait of Johor.

LOW CARBON TECH

• Over the longer term, Singapore could also potentially tap emerging low-carbon technologies, such as using hydrogen as a fuel or deploying carbon capture utilisation and storage to "suck" planet-warming carbon dioxide out of the air.

Such technologies are still relatively nascent, said Mr Chan, but the Government has set aside $49 million to fund low-carbon energy research and test-bedding efforts in hydrogen and carbon capture utilisation and storage. - THE STRAITS TIMES