EE In Education
Me and my former bosses under the banner of an ESCO initiated a series of initial discussions way back in 1999 with a concept paper to include EE in school curriculum. We realized that if we wanted to see EE as a practice by the future generations, education is the best way to do that. We presented few times to the Ministry of Education(MoE) especially to the Curriculum Development Center and finally they were convinced.Then requested us to send the detailed proposal.Among our major reference that time was Australia since our Technical EE Expert was from there and Australia already started EE in their education system.
I left the company not long after that but still kept in touch with them on the development of the proposal.In short , the proposal has gone further with the involvement of the Ministry of Energy,Telecom and Post, MoE and DANCED from Denmark. If I am not mistaken, CETREEE was also formed in relation to program as a lead local organization for the implementation at schools and university level.
What really made me quite happy although I was not involved directly in it, sometime in between 2004-2007, EE and RE already in the text books for secondary school children in Malaysia. MoE allocated them in a small section in the Form Two Science Subject Text Book. At least finally EE together with RE have been started to be introduced to our young generation at that stage compare to many of us here today .They were suppose to review the impacts after that and several discussions were held from 2009 between KeTTHA and MoE to address that after the new Undersecretary of Sustainable Energy at KeTTHA came into the picture in 2008.
Realizing the importance of having EE to be integrated into our education system, the Education and Awareness has been identified and made as one of the key thrusts in the draft National EE Master Plan with targeted lecturers and teachers to be trained in EE and also students and undergraduates to be educated in a 10-year period of the plan.
National EE Master Plan
And once again, announced by the ministry last month,the national EE master plan finally will be out in June 2013. What a big waste of time for more than one year. I do not dare to clap my hands yet until the plan is really out in public.
I am eagerly waiting to see what would the final content of the plan. It's not the numbers or targets that worry me but more on the key elements that should be in the plan itself.
When the responsible ministry is holding back with the plan, it does upset many parties involved in the study and development of Draft NEEMP because many of us believe although the plan is not perfect , it is already comprehensive enough to be referred as a blueprint to kick- start EE because it was developed with so much inputs,ideas,suggestions,feedback and recommendations by many experts and other parties too.
The issue now is... the only party that we have to depend on is the ministry because they are the only channel to convince the highest level policy making body which is the cabinet about the plan.When they do nothing, nothing will happen and when they hold it back much longer, we are wasting more time to make things better.
WE HAVE ALREADY THE DRAFT BLUEPRINT or Master Plan FOR EE AND WHAT IS THE BIGGEST RISKS FOR THE GOVERNMENT to endorse and implement it?
I remember being the parliament during the debate about RE Act in 2011 and as far as I can recall, there were no opposition parties even objected it and the debates mostly were all about the other issues such as technical issues, transparency and possible abuse of powers during the implementation. I believe because RE has been seen as the way forward by many educated Malaysians as a country to mitigate the impacts of depending too much on fossil fuels for our electricity generation and that was the main reason no one really said no for that.
So, what really scare the policy makers to do the same for EE now and who would possibly say NO to EE? I know some may...just like some critics for the RE Act and any other good things that anyone will try to do..
Since the announcement, some fellow EE practitioners and industry players did called and asked my opinion about the soon to be unveiled plan by the ministry. My comments were consistent...they key elements should not be too much different from plans by other countries. I would anticipate the key difference is on how the funding to be sourced and the mechanism to distribute fund to implement the plan.
The key elements should be taken as counter measures to address all barriers identified when the master plan study was carried out.Two crucial elements that must be in the plan are:
i) the dedicated law to cover electrical and thermal related energy usage to ensure key measures in the plan to be implemented by targeted groups
ii) a dedicated entity or agency to be accountable for the execution of the key measures and later to measure the performance against the intended 10-year targets for each energy using sector.This entity must be equipped with sufficient and competent resources to perform their duties as prescribed in the law and the plan.
these two key elements will enable the other support measures to provide a conducive environment for EE industry to grow to benefits the energy users from all segments of community namely business and public. Among the key supports measures that should be available is the plan are :
i) Sustainable fund sources and less bureaucratic and business friendly funding distribution mechanisms
ii) Structured education program with suitable syllabus and courses to create more competent people and professionals at primary, secondary and tertiary to support the EE industry development and future man power needs. The program must also cover the capacity building for the people to be involved in the delivery such as teachers, lecturers and etc.
iii) On going awareness programs and campaigns to inculcate EE practices in their lifestyle for the general public
iv) Gradual increase of electricity tariff or energy prices towards market rates.This must be synchronized with the implementation of key measures in the master plan to ensure the market and the people are ready with the key initiatives in the master plan as mitigation measures to prepare them and to move forward.
Now we just need to wait and see what would be the plan look like and we could only hope and pray for better things to come.
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