Taking into account the growing energy consumption and domestic energy supply constraints, Malaysia has set sustainable development and diversification of energy sources, as the economy’s main energy policy goals. The Five-Fuel Strategy recognises renewable energy resources as the economy’s fifth fuel after oil, coal, natural gas and hydro. Being a major agricultural commodity producer in the region Malaysia is well positioned amongst the ASEAN countries to promote the use of biomass as a source of renewable energy.

Major Biomass Resources in Malaysia

• Agricultural crops e.g. sugarcane, cassava, corn
• Agricultural residues e.g. rice straw, cassava rhizome, corncobs
• Woody biomass e.g. fast-growing trees, wood waste from wood mill, sawdust
• Agro-Industrial wastes e.g. rice husks from rice mills, molasses and bagasse from sugar refineries, residues from palm oil mills
• Municipal solid waste
• Animal manure and poultry litter

Palm Oil Biomass

Malaysia is the world’s leading exporter of palm oil, exporting more than 19.9 million tonnes of palm oil in 2017. The extraction of palm oil from palm fruits results in a large quantity of waste in the form of palm kernel shells, empty fruit bunches and mesocarp fibres. In 2011, more than 80 million tons of oil palm biomass was generated across the country.

Processing crude palm oil generates a foul-smelling effluent, called Palm Oil Mill Effluent or POME, which when treated using anaerobic processes, releases biogas. Around 58 million tons of POME is produced in Malaysia annually, which has the potential to produce an estimated 15 billion m³ of biogas.

Rice Husk

Rice husk is another important agricultural biomass resource in Malaysia with very good energy potential for biomass cogeneration. An example of its attractive energy potential is biomass power plant in the state of Perlis which uses rice husk as the main source of fuel and generates 10 MW power to meet the requirements of 30,000 households.

Municipal Solid Wastes

The per capita generation of solid waste in Malaysia varies from 0.45 to 1.44kg/day depending on the economic status of an area. Malaysian solid wastes contain very high organic waste and consequently high moisture content and bulk density of above 200kg/m³. The high rate of population growth is the country has resulted in rapid increase in solid waste generation which is usually dumped in landfills.

Conclusion

Biomass resources have long been identified as sustainable source of renewable energy particularly in countries where there is abundant agricultural activities. Intensive use of biomass as renewable energy source in Malaysia could reduce dependency on fossil fuels and significant advantage lies in reduction of net carbon dioxide emissions to atmosphere leading to less greenhouse effect. However, increased competitiveness will require large-scale investment and advances in technologies for converting this biomass to energy efficiently and economically.

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