Tuesday March 30, 2010
KUCHING: Power demand from energy-intensive industries in the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (Score) is expected to surge to some 3,000 MW by 2020, according to Sarawak Energy Bhd (SEB) senior manager (power systems planning) Dr Lee Hau Aik.
He said the current demand was merely 90MW from Press Metal Bhd's aluminium smelter in Mukah Division.
“Polysilicon-based industries will be the first to come on stream in the Samalaju Industrial Park, followed by mineral-processing industries and then aluminium smelters,” he told StarBiz after presenting a paper at the third international conference on Water resources and renewable energy development in Asia yesterday.
Dr Lee Hau Aik ... 'The Murum dam project is 10% to 15% completed.'
Dr Lee's paper was on “Hydropower for long-term power generation”.
The Samalaju park in Bintulu Division, which is currently under development, will be the home for Score's energy-intensive industries.
Chief Minister Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud, who opened the two-day event, said Score had already attracted RM30bil worth of investments.
Dr Lee said industries in Score would initially source the electricity from the Bakun and Murum hydroelectric dams.
The 2,400 MW Bakun dam is expected to start producing electricity late this year while the 944MW Murum dam will come on stream by late 2013.
“The Murum dam project is 10% to 15% completed. Work on the diversion tunnel project is on-going and, hopefully, the tunnels will be closed this year,” he added.
Dr Lee said besides catering to the energy-intensive industries and increasing demand from the domestic, commercial and industrial sectors, Sarawak's hyro-power would be exported to Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah.
as well as the Brunei/Indonesia/Malaysia/Philippines-East Asean Growth Areas.
He said if the targeted power load demand was achieved, SEB would next embark to develop the proposed Baram dam project (1,200MW) in northern Sarawak. The state government's permission might be sought later this year to proceed with the dam which would take five to six years to build. The Baram dam was planned to come on stream by 2017.
