Green Plus Issu 14

COLUMN
By KEVIN HOR
(Project Manager and Component 3 Consultant)
kevin.hor@jkr.gov.my
Malaysia v Romania
and Belarus
NO matter what the situation
of our economy is,
Malaysia is still a developing
country, at least in the
region, with the GDP of
roughly USD700 billion
— according to The World Book Data.
Based on population and geographical size,
it’s fair enough when we say Singapore has
moved triple the speed we are currently accelerated,
in any field including energy efficiency
in buildings. Its cliché to compare Malaysia
and Singapore, we are close competitors in
the ASEAN region.
But, where do we stand among the EU
countries when it comes to energy efficiency
in buildings? Let’s not be intimidated
by Germany but focus on countries that are
nearly similar to Malaysia in geographical size
and population such as Romania and Belarus.
Looking at initiatives for energy efficiency
in buildings, Malaysia is 10 years behind compared
to Belarus that kick-started its EE initiative
in the 90s with their Social Infrastructure
Retrofitting Project (SIRP). The country realized
the energy wasted in heating and lighting
poorly designed and maintained facilities and
requested support from the World Bank to retrofit
their public buildings and it was approved
in 2001.
This project that ended in 2010, has retrofitted
745 social sector buildings to improve its
efficiency and 300 educational facilities have
received lighting improvements, resulting 15%
of reduction in electricity consumption and
40,000 tons/year of CO2 reduction. The data
collected from this project itself could be a
good reference to Belarus to develop a successful
energy efficiency framework in the future.
Belarus took a smart step by approaching
the World Bank as this project paved the way
for the next World Bank operations in Belarus,
including Post Chernobyl Recovery Project
and Energy Efficiency Project, and contributed
to the dialogue on broader energy sector
reforms.
Support from the World Bank influence
the confidence in local bank for energy efficiency
investments. Most banks in Belarus
support energy efficiency projects compared
to Malaysia, where loans provided for energy
efficiency are still not their main priority,
even it is proven that it is one of the lowest
risk investments.
Belarus government gives full support to
energy efficiency programs, proven by their
investments in energy efficiency that reached
about US$ 3.86 billion over the past 15 years
which has made a significant progress in
improving energy efficiency in their country.
What about Romania? Based on GDP, even
with the current economy situation, Malaysia’s
economy is performing nearly 700 per cent
A photo-electric station in Belarus
higher than Romania, with the rapid growth
in the construction industrythat could easily
convince investor in energy efficiency projects.
This could be a strong reason why we should
have a higher goal in energy efficiency and
sustainability.
However, Romania is more daring and ambitious
to reduce 80 per cent of CO2 emissions
from the building sector alone by the year
2050.Some might think it’s an unrealistic goal
especially when your country has a legacy of
many buildings from the communist era that
are no longer fit for purpose. But looking at the
brighter side, higher goal means higher effort
from the government that has prepared for a
very organized framework to achieve it.
The government introduced Renovating
Romania that is divided into three phases. For
the first phase, the priority is to establish the
conditions whereby deep renovations, saving
at least 60%, become the norm within five
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Greenplus TM MARCH 2016