What could Singapore’s energy mix look like in 2035?

First published online at The Straits Times

About 40 per cent of Singapore’s greenhouse gas emissions now come from the power sector, so if the Republic is to reach its ambitious target of being net-zero by 2050, a lot of its efforts must go into greening this sector. Singapore has at its disposal more than 1GW-peak of solar power, which would take about 5 million sq m of solar photovoltaic cells to produce, said Prof Chan Siew Hwa, who is co-director of the Energy Research Institute at NTU. A recent study by the NTU carried out near the Sembawang hot springs showed there is potential to harness the heat inside the earth for power.

Prof Alessandro Romagnoli from NTU’s School of MAE, said that geothermal energy holds great potential for power generation in Singapore, especially if high temperature resources can be extracted from shallow depths.