Asean Power Grid

Introduction

Malaysia has experienced a substantial increase in energy consumption, with electricity demand per person rising from 1,460kWh in 1993 to 4,110kWh in 2013. Despite the scope and complexity of power interconnection projects, HAPUA has made significant progress in laying the necessary groundwork for the realization of the APG. To date, six (6) out of the 16 power interconnection projects for the APG have been implemented, connecting Singapore and Peninsula Malaysia, Thailand and Peninsula Malaysia, and others via Thailand to Cambodia, Lao PDR, and Vietnam, with a total of 3,489 MW in power exchanges and purchase achieved.

Even though coal is 100% imported and indigenous gas is depleting. Renewable Energy(RE) is not able to provide base-load requirement. Hydro capacity is Peninsular Malaysia is nearly fully developed. One of the measures the authorities in Malaysia is taking to ensure the continued availability of natural gas in the country, and continued national development is the liberalization of the gas market. This medium is also encouraging Sustainable Energy by improving the sustainability, efficiency, and reliability of the electricity subsector.

Optimization of Fuel Mix/Energy Mix from 2010 alone from 100% of total GWh provided by Generation Mix combine Coal, Gas, Hydro, Renewable Energy and Oil; 42% usage of oil, 52% Gas, 5% Hydro energy, 1% oil and no usage of Renewable Energy. Those only provide up to 108 175 GWh. But in 2015, Malaysia have produced 158 843 GWh by using from 43% of Coal, 40% of Gas, 14% of hydro, 2% of Renewable Energy and 1% of the oil. Malaysia has improved demand response through capitalizing on different regional that demand at peak timings.

As demand grows amid limited and declining supply, there is an urgent need to utilize available power as efficiently as possible while ensuring a sustainable and reliable supply, as well as energy security. Creating Smart grids helps fill gaps in electricity supply and reduce constraints from peak power demand while strengthening energy security. Malaysia has been working towards enhancing energy connectivity and market integration in ASEAN to achieve energy security, accessibility, affordability and sustainability for all member states.

Discussion

Public concern is important thing should be considering when power grid interconnections are built. It will have potential to be positive or negative side about grid interconnections. For more specific, it is crucial to consider the economic prosperity, social development and environmental as in being public concerns for people of the country which are involved in this project of ASEAN Power Grid (APG). For a country that is primary as the seller of electricity in grid interconnection system, they can export the electricity in exchange income for their country. Besides that, the government also need to look into the accessibility and affordability as 56% of ASEAN people are living in the rural areas so when the grid interconnection is completed. This can become one of the alternatives to connect the electricity to the rural areas also not forget that area which nearby at boundary country while other concerns need to consider is this project of grid interconnection can give an opportunity to people inside the country to a job from this industry.

International power grid interconnections can help to contribute toward the process of sustainable development. Electricity is arguably the most versatile of fuels, able to provide a wide variety of energy services, from running electronics, to providing light, motive power, and heat, typically as or more conveniently than other fuels, at high end-use efficiency, and with very low impacts on the environment and human health at the end-use level. Grid interconnections is one of the sustainable development in electricity generation which will give advantages for economy of the country, one of it is when grid interconnection is apply, it increasing competition in electricity generation as others country can also provide electricity as resulting in lowering electricity prices which could many domestic and foreign firms enter the local market in the country. Others than that, the country can reduce generation fuel costs by using generating plants through grid interconnections between countries which have a few types resources which more low cost than generation fuel. For example, a country like Myanmar have abundant resources like hydropower which can supply their exceeded electricity to Malaysia as Malaysia using coal for generating their electricity, in this case, Malaysia can save their budget for coal to another investment to generate the economy.

Some of the important advantages of APG system are, a reliability of the supply is increased between Asian country. Furthermore, APG system can reduce the capacity reserve. Thus, it also reduces the total installed capacity. Moreover, the interconnected system makes it possible to use the older and less efficient plants to carry peak loads of short duration. APG system also lowers the maintenance cost and capital cost by sharing the loads with other countries. Limitation or disadvantages of APG system are that APG system involves an extra cost to build a lot of interconnection stations. There also problems of loads and frequency that need to be controlled in a large interconnected system with many power stations scattered over the area. Concordantly, a system having one or two generating stations is more easy to handle.

Greater interconnections with our neighboring countries would also support the establishing of a larger regional market for electricity trading, promoting investments and ultimately enhancing regional electricity supply security. The virtue of that facts imports electricity will allow Malaysia to enhance our energy security by diversifying our energy mix, both regarding fuel type as well as supply sources. This will allow us to tap into new energy options that may be unavailable or economically infeasible in Malaysia. However, we need to ensure that the security and reliability of our power system are not comprised of being over-reliant on energy imports and spreading imports across various sources to mitigate concentration risk.