SARAWAK CORRIDOR OF RENEWABLE ENERGY

When I first heard of the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy, my first impression is that at least we have finally an interesting corridor which is different from all the north, south, east, west corridors everywhere in Malaysia. Of course, being a Malaysian, you question whether all those corridors will ever be successful when suddenly you heard of them to be started everywhere in the country.

Now, they come out with this 'BRILLIANT' idea of what the renewable energy is. It is to build as many dams as possible. DAMN! I am not an environmentalist but I fully believe in having renewable energies that do not force us to pay for the environment. What is this different than any other energy resources we are using now since we need to sacrifice a lot of nature just to achieve this?

Borneo houses Earth's oldest tropical rain forest--about 70 to 100 million years old. Like all rain forests, Borneo is wet--receiving about 5 meters (16.5 feet) of rain each year--and rich in biodiversity (the variety of living things in an area). More than 3,000 tree and 358 bird species are found in it. Therefore, why on earth in the whole Malaysia, they want to put all the dams in Sarawak? Why do we need to sacrifice Sarawak for all these? Sarawak and Sabah should be the last place in Malaysia to build all these dams if you want to preserve nature. This will also force a lot of people and villages to move elsewhere.

There are so many other renewable energy sources which are not as devastating to the nature as hydroelectric dams. This include wind, solar, biofuel and geothermal energy. Then again, I hope this will never materialize like the train railway project they have envisioned.

Sarawak to build 12 dams to meet future power needs
By TEH ENG HOCK and ROYCE CHEAH
Wednesday July 23, 2008

PETALING JAYA: Sarawak plans to build 12 hydroelectric dams to meet its future industrialisation needs.

The move has got environmentalists up in arms, questioning the need for the dams and the planned development of the state. They also suggested that Sarawak's national park may be threatened.

However, Deputy Energy, Water and Communications Minister Datuk Joseph Salang Gandum said the dams were necessary to meet energy demands.

They will be located at Ulu Air, Metjawah, Belaga, Baleh, Belepeh, Lawas, Tutoh, Limbang, Baram, Murum and Linau rivers. The plan will also see an extension to the Batang Ai dam.
All these are in addition to the 2,400MW Bakun dam and will push the total generating capacity in the state to 7,000MW by 2020, an increase of more than 600% from the current capacity.

The plans were in a presentation entitled Chinese Power Plants in Malaysia – Present and Future Development in October last year at the China-Asean Power Cooperation and Development Forum in Nanning, China.

The 48-slide presentation has been made available on the Internet.

Chinese companies were expected to design, build and commission the dams, the presentation said.

The Murum Dam project is scheduled to begin this year with a memorandum of understanding already signed between the Sarawak Energy Board and China Three Gorges Project Corporation.
It also said a detailed study on the Batang Ai extension was already under way while a feasibility study had commenced at Limbang and a pre-feasibility study had started at Baram.
Currently, Sarawak’s energy output is 933MW and it does not need any more energy.

However, there are plans to expand the aluminium-smelting industry in the state which will need the planned output. Furthermore, the Bakun dam’s 2,400MW was originally meant for peninsular Malaysia.

According to media reports, the Sarawak Government has already approved the building of an aluminium smelter by local company Press Metal Bhd.

Others which have shown interest includes China’s Luneng Group, Smelter Asia Sdn Bhd, Alcon Inc, Mitsubishi Corp, BHP Billiton Ltd and Australia’s Rio Tinto.

Centre for Environmental Technology and Development Malaysia chairman Gurmit Singh expressed concerns over the plan.

He said the proposal to build the dams and then look for energy-guzzling industries to use the energy was wrong.

He questioned how the building of the dams were related to the national energy policy.

“This is also a typical example of the ‘not in my backyard’ mentality where a country puts its polluting industries in other countries,” he said.

Salang said the 12 dams were necessary as consumption was projected to increase with the development of the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy.

He said the dams would only be approved if they passed their environmental impact assessment.
He added that he did not expect the projects to materialise any time soon although the plan was to complete all dams by 2020.