Cambodia is committed to incorporating more renewable energy into a new Ministry of Mines and Energy master plan, to mitigate the carbon footprint of the Kingdom’s socio-economic development, according to minister Suy Sem on September 16.
The minister made the comment via video link at the 15th East Asia Summit Energy Ministers Meeting during a session on “Cambodia’s Policy Plan, Challenges and Transitional Energy Efforts towards Carbon Reduction”.
The meeting was co-organised by the Bruneian energy ministry and the ASEAN Secretariat.
Sem told the meeting that Cambodia will continue to increase the utilisation of clean energy to the maximum extent possible, to mitigate some detrimental climate change impacts and ensure the security, accessibility, affordability and reliability of energy supply.
“For this purpose, we will integrate more renewable energy development projects into the PDP [power development plan], develop a utility-scale battery energy storage system [BESS] to accommodate more variable renewable energy [VRE] developments, and adopt policies and action plans for energy efficiency,” he said.
However, he admitted that the Kingdom must unavoidably depend on fossil fuels to some extent in the near-term, a reality he noted would be reflected in the new PDP.
“[But] the fossil fuels that we will use will be used more cleanly, so the deployment of ‘clean fossil fuel technologies’ such as clean coal technologies [CCT] and carbon capture utilisation and storage [CCUS] are important to us for the transition towards decarbonisation.
“We appreciate the research, development innovation, and technology transfer for new and emerging CCT and CCUS technologies,” he added.
He said Cambodia would continue to encourage investment in innovative technologies in key areas such as hydrogen, batteries and energy storage, as well as Internet of Energy (IoE).
These developments will be harnessed to upgrade and automate Cambodia’s power system to be cleaner, more efficient and more affordable, as well as to reduce waste and ensure a reasonable level of reliability, he explained.
He also called on the meeting’s participants to accelerate the adoption of renewables, clean fuels and other clean technologies, as well as the digitalisation of the energy systems and networks across their respective countries.
For its part, he said, the Kingdom “is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the country including in electricity generation”.
“To reach this objective, we are expecting more renewable energy generation sources and energy-efficiency projects in the coming years.
“This, of course, implies more opportunities for private investors and the government to work together and mobilise more investment and financing for such a transformation to happen,” he added.
