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Published: Monday October 19, 2009 MYT 3:07:00 PM

Govt incentives for pam oil millers to trap methane gas


KUALA LUMPUR: The government is planning to provide better incentives to palm oil millers to trap methane gas in their operations as part of efforts to mitigate global warming issues.

The Malaysian Palm Oil Council (MPOC) chief executive officer, Tan Sri Dr Yusof Basiron said currently, about 96 per cent of palm oil mills in the country are still without the capability to trap methane.

"Besides mitigating global warming issues, palm oil millers can use the methane gas to generate electricity and sell it to Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB)," Yusof told reporters after officiating the International Palm Oil Lifecycle Assessment Conference (IPLC) 2009 here on Monday.

He said TNB is offering to buy the electricity generated at 21 sen per kilowatt hour.

Yusof said TNB also needs to speed up the connectivity of electricity from mills to the national grid as at the moment, it seem to be a stumbling block.

"The exercise needs to be better coordinated with more mills in the country, to facilitate the connection of electricity generated through the burning of methane gas, to the national grid," he added.

Meanwhile, the Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) chairman Datuk Sabri Ahmad said there were a lot of challenges towards getting millers to trap the methane gas as it involved a sizeable investment of about RM4mil-RM6mil per mill.

Asked about recent news that the government's B5 biodiesel programme had recorded a poor take-up rate by its initial target group, Yusof said:"The take-up rate is not poor.

"The B5 biofuel programme is only entering the first phase.

"This phase is for its use by government agencies. At the moment, the current usage by government vehicles is good and so far, we haven't heard any complains," he said.

B5 is a blend of five per cent biodiesel and 95 per cent fossil fuel diesel.

Meanwhile, the IPLC with the theme "Harmonising Palm Oil's Life Cycle Assessment for GHG Savings", aims to highlight the current Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) results used to determine the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) savings value for biofuels.

It also aims to consolidate these findings into a universally acceptable value for GHG calculations. - BERNAMA


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