Malaysia to boost renewable energy generation by more than 5 times

Malaysia will increase the percentage of electricity generated from renewable energy to 5.5 per cent from the less than one per cent currently.

Energy Commission of Malaysia CEO Datuk Ir Ahmad Fauzi Hasan said the higher percentage was achievable through the establishment of the Sustainable Energy Development Authority.

"We have the RE Act, feed-in tariff mechanism, infrastructures needed as well as the system, insyaallah we can achieve it," he said.

"We need the Act as our fossil fuel, gas and oil are depleting. We need to find something that can be an alternative substitute. The other thing is our climate has to be protected," he told Bernama.

Ahmad also noted that the Japanese culture in adopting efficient energy use should be emulated. "It should be the ultimate goal if a country wants consumers to use their resources efficiently, he said.

Elaborating further, Ahmad said Malaysians need to appreciate the subsidies given by the government, without which, the price of electricity and fuel resources would be expensive.

"Basically, the government is rationalising the subsidy so that we can slowly move towards the market price. Then, people would know the true cost of the resource. Hopefully, that would be more efficient," he added.