March 3, 2008 (The Edge Daily) – Carbon Capital Corp Sdn Bhd will launch RM150 million worth of biogas and biomass projects in Sarawak next month as part of its long-term strategy for growth.
“We will be launching four biogas projects and one 10 megawatt biomass power plant there, utilising empty fruit bunches (from oil palm).
“These are all projects which we will be investing in and developing 100%,” Carbon Capital group managing director William Kho said.
February 11, 2008 (Yomiuri Shimbun) – The Economy, Trade and Industry Ministry plans to expand the nation’s environment-focused business sector to about 83 trillion yen in 2015, from 59 trillion yen in 2005, sources said. In June, the ministry plans to draw up policies to achieve this target that will include proposals for popularizing environmentally friendly technologies and businesses, according to the sources.
The ministry will promote the plan to participants at the Group of Eight summit meeting, which is to focus on environmental issues, to be held in Toyakocho, Hokkaido in July.
The ministry believes the domestic market for businesses involved in tackling global warming could grow by 54 percent to 49 trillion yen by 2015 from the 2005 level.
February 11, 2008 (Bangkok Post) – To cope with high oil prices and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Thailand must pursue four options: development of renewable energy, energy efficiency, nuclear energy and carbon capture and storage. However, renewable energy has certain limitations, and options for each country are different depending on availability of natural resources, technologies and manpower. This is why the Thai government has mainly concentrated on renewable energy based on domestic raw materials and wastes.
Financial incentives together with the provision of information to investors and consumers have proved to work wonders, for instance in the promotion of biofuels. The consumption of gasohol (E10) more than doubled in 2007. With the introduction of E20 in 2008, daily demand for ethanol should reach two million litres by 2011 when new cars capable of using E85 should be on sale.
January 9, 2008 (BBC) – The Chinese government says it is banning shops from handing out free plastic bags from June this year, in a bid to curb pollution. Production of ultra-thin plastic bags will also be banned, the State Council said in a statement.
Instead, people will be encouraged to use baskets or reusable cloth bags for their shopping, the council said.
December 3, 2007 (Biofuel Review) – A 200 acre Biofuel Integrated Environmental Park is to be built Malaysian State of Perak at a cost of $400 million, it was announced last week. The project, a joint venture between the Perak State Government and Earth Biofuel (Asia) Sdn Bhd, will involve 900,000 carbon credit, a centralized treatment system for 4000 m3/hr industrial & biological waste water, methane gas recovery for 300,000 tonne/year landfill and R&D cum Training Centre generating about 30,000 jobs related to the project. Continue reading
November 14, 2007 (LiveMint WSJ) – A Mumbai start-up may have well discovered a way to convert plastic, organic and electronic waste into petroleum without the usual harmful residue, and, emboldened by encouraging results from tests in the Netherlands, West Asia, and Malaysia, is now setting up plants that can process 25 tonnes of plastic a day in Austria, Italy, Germany, and the Netherlands. Such plants, which cost $2-3 million (Rs7.88-11.82 crore) each, can produce up to 25,000 litres of petroleum a day, at an operating cost of Rs12 a litre (excluding cost of raw materials).
Plastic-to-petrol technologies aren’t new, but most of them have proved commercially unviable for a variety of reasons including poor quality of fuel produced or the ability to process only particular kinds of plastic waste.
October 21, 2007 (Dubai Multi Commodities Centre) – Dubai Multi Commodities Centre and EcoSecurities announced today that they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Zero Waste Technology to jointly develop municipal waste treatment centers using anaerobic digestion projects under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). Continue reading
September 17, 2007 (People.com.cn) – An international workshop, sponsored by China’s top think tank and the UN Environment Program, recently in Beijing highlighted the significance in the participation of businesses in dealing with climate change. This is one of the first high-profile events for Chinese enterprises on the issue of climate change.
There is a large gap of awareness between Chinese enterprises and their international peers on the importance of integrating a program on climate change into their operational strategies and daily agendas. Experts and officials agree that it is not a question of whether or when, but how companies should face the risks and opportunities brought about by climate change.
September 10, 2007 (TheNewsToday.info) – The Philippine Bio Sciences Company, Inc. (PhilBIO), a company which is into bio-gas and wastewater treatment, is offering the city government a solution to its power needs by converting the city’s waste to energy. Continue reading
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