PUTRAJAYA: The government is on track to reduce its carbon footprint after saving 47.7 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity at all 25 ministries and the Prime Minister's Department last year.
The Energy Commission on Thursday (Oct 18) said this translated into savings of up to RM17.4 million, thanks to the government's ongoing energy-saving programmes.
It also said the government slashed power consumption by 17.9 per cent and reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 33,100 thousand tons of CO2.
“This comparison of savings is based on a baseline that was formulated from data in 2013, prior to the implementation of the programme to improve energy efficiency and electricity consumption in government buildings in 2014.
“Compared to 2016, a saving of 7.3 per cent worth RM6.3 million has been recorded,” said the commission in a statement today.
The significant increase in savings, it added, was possible due to the success of various initiatives by the government, including setting the air conditioners temperatures at 24 degrees Celsius; retrofitting the Building Control System (BCS) and the conversion to light-emitting diode (LED) for lights in ministry buildings.
“The Energy Commission is the agency appointed to implement and regulate these programmes. This programme is in line with the government’s commitment to reduce the country’s carbon intensity,” it said.
It was reported on April 1 last year that Malaysia’s power generation industry spent RM15.1 billion to generate 120,059 gigawatt-hours (GWh) of electricity for 8.45 million customers in Peninsular Malaysia.
In order to reduce fossil fuel dependency, experts were quoted as saying that the energy mix was introduced as an alternative measure to face its shortage.
In Malaysia, this energy mix strategy was said to have successfully reduced dependency on oil significantly, from 87 per cent in 1980, to less than one per cent today.