The Clinton Climate Initiative recently completed an assessment of the potential for CCS technologies to contribute to greenhouse gas emissions reduction efforts in Malaysia.  Our organization has an established history of working with government and industry stakeholders in developed countries like the United States, Australia, and the Netherlands to better understand the importance of the technologies in reducing CO₂ emissions.  In many of these countries, there are government funds set aside in support of projects, and stakeholders grapple with questions about the best uses of that money.

For a developing country like Malaysia, there is a unique set of opportunities and challenges for deployment of CCS.  We quickly discovered that the opportunities in Malaysia are very real.  In Copenhagen in 2009, Prime Minister Najib made a public commitment to reducing CO₂ emission intensity of the country by 40% by 2020.  Even before that commitment, Malaysia became the first government member of the Global CCS Institute, with whom the Clinton Climate Initiative also has a formal partnership.  The clear message we get is that Malaysia is
serious about its carbon footprint.

On top of that, trends in the resource and power industries that form the backbone of Malaysia’s economy will heighten the government’s interest in domestic CCS.  Natural gas use for export and energy has been the key to Malaysia’s economic muscle for decades, and the increasing CO₂ content of its remaining reserves will spur interest in natural gas separation and reinjection.  That application of the technology has been at the vanguard of awareness and discussion about CCS globally, progressing the legislative and regulatory frameworks, public acceptance, and geological knowledge that are critical to the growth of the industry.  The prospect of reduced natural gas in Malaysia has also prompted energy feedstock diversification, with the recent and planned addition of substantial coal power capacity.  The impact of coal plants on carbon footprint and the opportunity for CCS to mitigate that impact are important considerations for the Ministry of Energy, Green, Technology, and Water (KeTTHA) our partner in the Study.

Among the challenges for CCS deployment in Malaysia, probably the most important is funding.  Without a large surplus of money available for clean energy projects, Malaysia uses CDM projects to accomplish many of its greenhouse gas reductions and is an accomplished host of projects.  Its state-owned oil & gas producer, PETRONAS, helped sponsor one of the first applications for a CDM methodology for CCS.  Including CCS in the CDM would almost certainly unlock a great deal of interest in support for those technologies.  It often felt like the first question in all of our stakeholders meetings for the study was, ‘When will CCS be included in the CDM?”