2008 Environmental Performance Index: Malaysia 26th in the world

Malaysia is ranked at the 26th position globally based on environmental performance according to the 2008 Environmental Performance Index (EPI). The report was published by a team of experts from Yale University and Columbia University in early 2008.

The scoring was developed under six established policy categories; Environmental Health, Air Pollution, Water Resources, Biodiversity and Habitat, Productive Natural Resources, and Climate Change. Under each category, various performance indicators were applied which contributed to the overall score. The EPI identifies broadly-accepted targets for environmental performance and measures how close each country comes to these goals. In total, there were 25 performance indicators used for the ranking of 149 countries.

Construction of the EPI (Courtesy of http://epi.yale.edu)
click to enlarge

The first EPI report was first introduced in 2006 with the Pilot 2006 EPI. The EPI was preceded by the 2005 Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI). The EPI differs from the ESI because it stresses a comparison of current conditions with targets as opposed to long term sustainability. Underdeveloped African countries may be relatively unpolluted (and therefore rank high on long-term sustainability), but may not be providing drinking water and sanitation services for their current population. Other countries, such as the UK and Germany, may be handling current environmental challenges well, but face difficult long-term sustainability problems.

The EPI score ranged from 0 to 100. Malaysia's ranking has dropped from the 9th position in the 2006 EPI to the 26th in the current report. In term of score however, Malaysia has been able to accumulate 84.0 in score in 2008, alongside Denmark, compared to 83.3 in 2006. There were an additional five indicators included in the 2008 analysis.

According to the 2008 EPI, Switzerland dominates once more in term of environmental performance with the score of 95.5. Having scoring above 80, Malaysia's effort in managing its environment can be considered suffice. In respect of Asian countries, Malaysia sits on the 2nd position, only to fall behind Japan. Among Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member countries, Malaysia lies on 4th trailing New Zealand, Canada and Japan.

Of all six categories used to benchmark Malaysia environmental performance, only two categories which Malaysia fails to achieve more than 80 individual score. Malaysia scores exceptionally well in Air Pollution and Environmental Health with the scores of 97.9 and 96.7, respectively. The nation also manages to perform sufficiently in Water Resources and Productive Natural Resources, 84.4 and 83.6 respectively. However the good form was not reflected in the Biodiversity and Habitat, and Climate Change categories scoring only of 68.3 and 61.9, respectively.

Although the report does not suggest causation, the low score in Biodiversity and Habitat category would points out the impacts of deforestation due to rapid logging and plantation activities. As for the Climate Change category, the CO2 emission in Malaysia although is not at a critical state but has developed at an alarming rate. With the nation's goal in heading towards sustainable environment, policy makers could use the under-performing indicators revealed in the EPI report as areas to look further into.

References

Esty, D.C., Levy, M.A., Srebotnjak, T., de Sherbinin, A. , Kim, C.H., and Mara, V. (2008). 2008 Environmental Performance Index. Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. Retrieved from http://www.yale.edu/epi/files/2008EPI_Text.pdf

Esty, D.C., Levy, M.A., Srebotnjak, T., de Sherbinin, A. , Kim, C.H., and Anderson, B. (2006). Pilot 2006 Environmental Performance Index. Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. Retrieved from http://www.yale.edu/epi/2006EPI_MainReport.pdf

Political and judicial influences on environmental issues in Malaysia

The recent detentions of opposition figures in Malaysia had spurred mounting unrest from the public, be it from the government supporters never mind the opposition parties themselves. The controversial Internal Security Act (ISA) 1960 used in the arrests, as well on several other occasions, has allegedly being accused as a misuse by the ruling party for its own interest.

The act was originally drafted as a pre-emptive measure to curb the communist movement during the early post-independence era. Under ISA, possible threats which are identified by the Home Minister can be held captive without proper trials for the duration of 60 days and can be extended to two years in which the detainee is transferred to the infamous Kamunting Detention Centre.

After the armed insurgency by the Malayan Communist Party had been resolved, ISA is still being enforced from time to time. It serves the purpose of protecting the nation's security, the maintenance of essential services and the economic life of Malaysia.

Nowadays, ISA has been more relevant than ever as new threats in the form of global and local terrorism going on sporadically and not to exclude socio-politic turmoil. This could be evident by the cripple of the Jemaah Islamiah, 1999 Reformation and, most recent, Hindraf subversive movements.

The most notable ISA arrest would be the 1987 Operation Lalang. It is reported that 106 detainees were arrested due to various allegedly wrongdoings from political to religious involvements during the cleanup.

However, one quite interesting involvement was overshadowed by the other high profile detention personalities. At least five detainees were brought in due to being rampant environmental activists. These prominent environmentalists were from various NGOs which include Environmental Protection Society of Malaysia (EPSM), Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM, the Malaysian's Friends of the Earth) and Perak Anti-Radioactive Committee (PARC).

Tan Ka Kheng, the Vice President of EPSM and also a former lecturer at the Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, was accused to be involved in 'activities propagating communist influence and ideology among specific section of populations in Malaysia' and had 'undermined national security'. Meanwhile a legal advisor to SAM and Consumers Association of Penang (CAP), Meenakshi Raman, was also detained in Operation Lalang with similar allegations.

Both, together with fellow environmentalists detained, played an instrumental role in the most controversial environmental issues in the nation's history, which are the Asian Rare Earth plant's radiation and the protest of the proposed Bakun Dam. These two issues had become landmarks in the political and judicial superiority in rendering public concerns and protests impotent.

Asian Rare Earth plant was a joint venture between a Japanese company, Matsushita Chemicals and local business entities notably Lembaga Urusan Tabung Haji and state-owned Pilgrim's Management Fund Board besides several bumiputera businessmen. Incorporated in 1979, Asian Rare Earth (ARE) Sdn. Bhd. was involved in the extracting of monazite, found in tin ore in Bukit Merah, Perak.

Monazite was used to produce rare earth compound for the manufacturing of colour TV tubes and calcium phosphates whilst producing radioactive by-products, thorium hydroxide and barium radium sulphate. Prior to ARE began production, a contract was drawn up in 1982 whereby the radioactive waste generated would become the property of the Perak State Government.

It had been made known that the radiation and pollution from ARE were devastating to the local residents. In February 1985, eight residents of Bukit Merah New Village filed a complaint against ARE with the High Court of Ipoh alleging that exposure to ARE's radioactive materials and waste were harmful to their health. They demanded the cessation of the plant's operation, clean-up of the radioactive materials and payment for damages (without specifying any amount). An injunction was obtained in November 1985 ordering ARE to cease its operation.

Despite this, a licence was granted in February 1987 to ARE by a five-member Atomic Energy Licensing Board (AELB), representatives from the Tun Ismail Atomic Research Centre (PUSPATI), the Ministry of Health, and the Ministry of Science, Technology and the Environment. ARE interpreted it as the green light to resume its operations even though the legal action was still in process.

In July 1992, the high court ordered ARE to suspend operations. ARE then appealed the case to the Supreme Court seeking to overrule the lower court's injunctions. The Malaysia's Supreme Court ruled in December 1993 that there was no evidence that ARE was contaminating the local environment and rejected a high court ruling that the firm cease operations.

This would make contrary with reports saying childhood leukemia was 40 times higher than the surrounding areas besides high rate of miscarriages and infant mortality. Eight international experts claimed that the storage site was found unsafe. There were opinions saying that the Supreme Court ruling to be politically motivated. The closure of the plant would cause undue hardship to the 183 workers and shareholders thus reversing the High Court decision that favourable to the community.

Tan Ka Kheng and several SAM members were also questioning the needs of the proposed Bakun Dam. The High Court ruled that the mega project had violated the Environmental Quality Act, due to flaws in the Environmental Impacts Assessment (EIA) reports. Although the Bakun Dam suffered a series on setbacks in the course of construction, none of them came from environmental considerations. Economic recessions, engineering difficulties and corporate restructuring were issues that had caused the setbacks.

The then-Prime Minister had reckoned that the dam will benefit the nation that the environmental and social costs it inflicted will be outweighed in a long run. Currently, the construction of the 2,400 MW electricity generating reservoir is ongoing but with little progress.

Due to their belligerence, Tan Ka Kheng was detained for two years whilst Meenakshi was jailed for forty five days. The fate of fellow environmentalist detainees varies from being placed under residence order to detention, both for a period of two years.

Another good example of political and judicial involvement is the Bright Sparkler firework inferno in 1991. The disaster highlights the lack of coordination and strict enforcement among various government agencies. But interestingly how the plant managed to operate for 20 years illegally would also invite undesired speculations. To add to that, the Royal Commission of Inquiry was stopped in the middle of the investigation and was undone. This was justified by the adapted government policy that ban firework manufacturing operations following this devastating disaster hence the completion of the royal commission was considered unnecessary.

As of today, no charges where held against the executive officers nor the board of directors of the company in the court of law. The pending court hearing on the settlement for the victim families only shows the level of complexity in bringing the responsible parties forward. It has always been a tall order for environmentalists to fight on any issue when political and judicial stand in their way.

References

Rowell, A. (1996). Green Backlash: Global Subversion of the Environmental Movement. Routledge.

Toshiro, U. (2001). 4 Four Elements of Legal System: A Lesson from Asian Rare Earth Case [PDF document]. Retrieved from http://www.isc.niigata-u.ac.jp/~miyatah/nu/2004/env/ARE_case_by_makino2001-ch2-3-4.pdf

Asian Rare Earth. (n.d.) In Sahabat Alam Malaysia: The A-Z of the Malaysia Environment online. Retrieved September 1, 2008, from http://www.surforever.com/sam/a2z/content1.html

Furuoka, F. and Lo, M.C. (2005). Japanese Multinational Corporations and the Export of Pollution: The Case of Bukit Merah. Electronic Journal of Contemporary Japanese Studies. Retrieved from http://www.japanesestudies.org.uk/articles/2005/FuruokaandChiun.html

Geothermal Heating and Cooling

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Geothermal Heating/Cooling Systems
Residential Environmental Design, unknown published date, unknown author

The application of geothermal heating/cooling, also known as ground source heat pumps, has been named "the most energy-efficient and environmentally sensitive of all space conditioning systems", by the Environmental Protection Agency. The system's basic concept takes advantage of the earth's constant temperature, approximately 55 degrees, to heat and cool a building. By tapping this steady flow of heat from the earth in the winter, and displacing heat in the earth in the summer, a geothermal heat pump can save homeowners 40 to 70 percent in heating costs and 30 to 50 percent in cooling costs compared to conventional systems.. read more

Comment by SS

In the pursuit of sustainable environment, systems with high efficiency and produce less pollution are brought into perspective. Geothermal would provide a solution for energy efficiency and an option of renewable energy. Since 1960, geothermal has been applied in power generation at locations with geothermal resources such as steam, hot springs and hot dry rock.

During the late 90s, another application was introduced from geothermal and received lots of attention since. Heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) of buildings had benefited greatly from the development of geothermal technology. It is said that geothermal provides high efficiency and eco-friendly solution for heating and cooling purposes.

Geothermal systems work with the environment to provide clean, efficient, and energy-saving heating and cooling the year round. Geothermal systems use less energy than alternative heating and cooling systems, helping to conserve our natural resources. Geothermal systems do not need large cooling towers and their running costs are lower than conventional heating and air-conditioning systems.

A geothermal heat pump system is a heating and/or an air conditioning system that uses the Earth's ability to store heat in the ground and water thermal masses. Geothermal heat pumps are similar to ordinary heat pumps, but use the ground instead of outside air to provide heating, air conditioning and, in most cases, hot water. Because they use the earth's natural heat, they are among the most efficient and comfortable heating and cooling technologies currently available.

Studies had shown that by switching on to geothermal system, a significant amount of savings could be made in terms of monetary and pollution loads. Geothermal systems save homeowners 30-70 percent in heating costs, and 20-50 percent in cooling costs, compared to conventional systems. Geothermal systems also save money in other ways. They are highly reliable, require little maintenance, and are built to last for decades. They add considerably to the value of homes.

Geothermal systems also support the 'green building concept' which encompasses the practice of increasing efficiency with which buildings use resources — energy, water, and materials — while reducing building impacts on human health and the environment during the building's lifecycle, through better siting, design, construction, operation, maintenance, and removal.

In terms of environment-friendliness, the current use of geothermal heat pump technology has resulted in the following emissions reductions

• Elimination of more than 5.8 million metric tons of CO2 annually
• Elimination of more than 1.6 million metric tons of carbon equivalent annually

These 1,000,000 installations have also resulted in the following energy consumption reductions

• Annual savings of nearly 8,000 GWh
• Annual savings of nearly 40 trillion Btus of fossil fuels
• Reduced electricity demand by more than 2.6 GW

The impact of the current use of geothermal heat pumps is equivalent to

• Taking close to 1,295,000 cars off the road
• Planting more than 385 million trees
• Reducing U.S. reliance on imported fuels by 21.5 million barrels (3,420,000 m³) of crude oil per year.

In all types of geothermal systems, the heat from the ground is transferred in storage tanks in buildings, where it is used for domestic hot water or even forced-air heating system. In some cases the heat is boosted through reverse refrigeration technology (the compressor system in a fridge works by flowing the air through it; this uses the reverse in order to heat it). Geothermal systems can also deliver effective air conditioning during hot weather as well as heat during cold weather.

Illustration courtesy of Green Living for Dummies

Geothermal heating and cooling, or geothermal technology in general, is still an alien to Malaysian. This may due to the fact that Malaysia is not blessed with geothermal resources. However with the development of geothermal (ground source) heat pump, there are a lot of opportunity as cooling system in Malaysia currently depends totally on air-source heat pump.

The main barriers for geothermal heating and cooling in Malaysia are the economics and expertise. A geothermal system can cost as much as 30 percent more than conventional heating and cooling systems. Another drawback to geothermal installation is the lack of qualified contractors who know how to properly design, install, and service the systems.

Malaysians drilling engineers who are sick and tired of life off-shore may want to venture into geothermal installation field. The installation is very similar to drilling the earth for oil except for the part where looping pipes are inserted into the bored ground to allow water circulation for heat removal.

References

Jeffer. Y., Barclay, Liz., Grosvenor, M. (2008). Green Living for Dummies, Wiley Publishing Inc.

F. Rui., Jiang. Y., Yao, Y., Ma. Z. Theoretical study on the performance of an integrated ground-source heat pump system in a whole year Energy, 32(11), 2199-2209.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_heating

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geothermal_heat_pump

http://geoexchange.org/

Environmental Management in Accounting Perspective

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Environmental Accounting
Financial Management, Apr 2007 by Martin, Bob

If a company's accounts fail to pay full consideration to the green issues affecting its business, can they actually show a true and fair view? Bob Martin investigates.

While green issues are hot news and public awareness of them is at an all-time high, the media tend to concentrate on climate change and carbon trading, which are often seen as beyond the scope of businesses to affect over and above the legal obligations imposed on them. Other press coverage focuses on the promises made by directors in corporate social responsibility reports to adopt more ecologically sustainable production methods and so forth pledges for which they can only be held accountable in future, perhaps on someone else's watch.. read more

Comment by SS

Environmental accounting has received increased attentions in the 1980s as an effort in promoting environmentally sound and sustainable socio-economic development. The publication of Handbook of National Accounting - Integrated Environment and Economic Accounting is a milestone for environmental accounting; published in responds to the request in Agenda 21 of the Earth Summit of Rio de Janeiro in 1992.

Environmental accounting practice, according to the handbook, incorporates environmental concerns including natural resource depletion, environmental quality degradation and environmental protection into national accounts by means of a system of integrated environmental and economic accounting (SEEA).

United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) identifies the application of Environmental Management Accounting (EMA) in its publication Environmental Management Accounting Procedures and Principles. Application fields for the use of EMA data are

• Assessment of annual environmental costs/expenditure;
• Product pricing;
• Budgeting;
• Investment appraisal, calculating investment options;
• Calculating costs, savings and benefits of environmental projects;
• Design and implementation of environmental management systems;
• Environmental performance evaluation, indicators and benchmarking;
• Setting quantified performance targets;
• Cleaner production, pollution prevention, supply chain management and design for environment projects;
• External disclosure of environmental expenditures, investments and liabilities;
• External environmental or sustainability reporting;
• Other reporting of environmental data to statistical agencies and local authorities.

Environmental accounting is also applied as a tool by corporate bodies on the cost structure and environmental performance. Environmental accounting is most commonly undertaken as voluntary self-reporting by companies, third-party reports by government agencies, NGOs and other bodies. This would portrait the envisagement of such organizations on their environmental accountability.

Impacts on the environment may be accounted and reflected within a company’s financial statements, relating to liabilities, commitments and contingencies for the remediation of contaminated lands or other financial concerns arising from pollution. Environmental reports may also account for pollution emissions, resources used, or wildlife habitat damaged or re-established. These reports can be useful when dealing with environmental legislation, or not, as in the Bartoline v Royal & SunAlliance Insurance pic and Heath Lambert Limited judgment.

Engineering or technical principles is an essential component in EMA. Using the First and Second Laws of thermodynamics, an energy balance can be used to track energy through a system. This is a very useful tool for determining resource use and environmental impacts to determine how much energy is needed at each point in a system, and in what form that energy is a cost in various environmental issues. The energy accounting system keeps track of energy in, energy out, and non-useful energy versus work done, and transformations within the system.

The mitigation of climate change and global warming emphasizes on the economic incentives on the reduction for achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants. Flexible Mechanisms includes Emissions Trading, Clean Development Mechanism and Joint Implementation defined under the Kyoto Protocol intended to lower the overall costs of achieving its emissions targets. EMA knowledge and expertise is key to such mechanisms. Some of the issues involving environmental accounting are related to credits cap, emission reduction, carbon trading, carbon taxes, Marginal Abatement Cost (MAP) and project validation.

Paradoxes in Palm Oil Issues

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New Britain Palm Oil to Open UK Refinery

• Angela Balakrishnan
  
• Monday August 04 2008 09:44 BST
  

New Britain Palm Oil is opening a refinery in the UK which it claims will allow shoppers to know exactly where the palm oil in their shopping basket comes from.

Papua New Guinea's largest palm oil producer said it will invest £18m to build a processing plant in the UK to produce refined palm oil aimed at satisfying growing demand from the European Union. The site will enable customers to buy goods with "fully traceable and sustainable" palm oil down to the tree from which the oil came from, it said.. read more

Comment by SS

All these while, Malaysia had been heavily condemned by developed countries due to its effort in promoting palm oil, mainly as a source of food. Being one of the top nation's commodity, which has span around 100 years in history, it is estimated that more than 11 million hectares of palm plantations had already replaced tropical rainforest. Despite the pros of palm oil, many studies highlight the negative impacts it has on environmental, social and cultural aspects.

Although we have to admit that palm oil production would have detrimental effects on human and the earth, as any other development would, some of the effects were being exaggeratedly magnified possibly due to some hidden agendas. Some may opt to view this as politically and economically motivated. The hidden objective behind the propaganda is to undermine the advantages of palm oil products that would create an unequal competition on existing goods such as soybean and corn derivations. The latter products are produced by developed countries and they are at the losing end of the competition. Another probable motive could be that western world envies the emergence of developing countries such as Malaysia for becoming the exporter of this valuable commodity.

But that was some issues in the past. Only the unsustainable approach in opening new plantations had been heavily criticized by environmentalists. The world's view on palm oil has taken 180 degree turn in the past decade. Other than negative impacts on the environment, health issues such as cardiovascular disease concerning palm oil consumptions had been silenced along with the increasing demand of its products. This would be evident by the ever growing demand especially from EU countries on palm oil. It is said that every 1 out of 10 goods on supermarket shelves in the EU, if not in the entire world, contains palm oil.

With the conceptualizing of biofuels and bioproducts to combat global warming, palm oil is experiencing high levels of demand for energy generation purposes. The Netherlands, the world's largest single importer of palm oil, had invested hundreds of millions of euros in making power plants compatible with palm oil.

The world is now on the verge of food crisis. Many human activist organizations are against the food-for-biofuels idea. This is a challenge for palm oil producers to withstand and balance between food and biofuels demand.

Greenhouse gas emissions would be a rhetoric in palm oil production. A study indicates that Indonesia, another palm oil producer champion besides Malaysia, produces 8% of anthropogenic CO2 and the third largest contributor to global warming. This is mainly due to the destruction of peatland through slash-and-burn activities. The atmospheric air quality would also be supremely reduced as a result of this. Deforestation would also affect water catchment areas hence taking the blame of now-commonly flash flood and landslide occurrences. The endangered wild animals such as orang utans, tigers and elephants would also get their share through the abolition of their biodiversity.

In spite the setbacks we use to perceive, palm oil production is not that bad after all. Through sustainable approach in managing land exploitations, the impacts on the environment could be minimized to an acceptable degree. The greenhouse gas emissions could be counterbalanced by palm trees "afforestation". The principal belief of environmentalists is plausible; growing plants that absorb CO2, burning their products which releases CO2 and planting new palm trees creates a closed cycle. The "forest" of palm trees would offset the rainforest it replaces, if not to equate them.

Malaysia would benefit from Clean Development Mechanism under Kyoto Protocol through palm oil. Much of the recent investment in new palm plantations for biofuel has been part-funded through carbon credit projects. However the reputational risk associated with unsustainable palm plantations in Indonesia has now made many funds wary of investing there.

The developed world could buy or lease rainforest in Malaysia and Indonesia, producing palm oil themselves instead of buying them. That would preserve rainforest from logging whilst also benefiting the climate and sustaining economic growth in their region. This idea squeezes Malaysian and Indonesian governments to be more careful and prudent in managing plantations to avoid mismanagement accusation. But in the end, it is rather the palm oil and timber demand of the developed countries that drives logging and the expansion of palm oil estates.