To address climate change challenge, there is a limit to focusing only on supply side of electricity and adding utility scale renewable power generation capacity. Centralized power grid system proves to be an impediment to realize full potential of renewable power, due to transmission losses and curtailment especially in Southeast Asia.
Also, more than half of energy-related CO2 emissions comes from non-electricity energy use. The share of renewable energy in total final energy consumption was only 11% as of 2018 globally.
To achieve further decarbonization, we need to focus more on demand side of energy use, such as Distributed Energy, Demand Management, Electrification and Alternative Fuel. JICP proposes to call such approaches collectively “Demand-Side Climate Actions”.
Home to 650m people, Southeast Asia is growing fast, and its share in global CO2 emission is rising fast. At the same time, the region is one of the most vulnerable parts of the world to climate change. Despite relatively abundant renewable resource, deployment of renewable power generation capacity in the region lags far behind other larger economies.
JICP’s second whitepaper, “Demand Side Climate Actions – Opportunities in Southeast Asia” provides an overview of various components of Demand-Side Climate Actions, and reveals that Southeast Asia has numerous advantages in advancing Demand-Side Climate Actions, offering interesting impactful investment opportunities.
