National Climate Change Secretariat Consults on Singapore’s Decarbonisation Journey

The National Climate Change Secretariat in the Strategy Group, Prime Minister’s Office (“NCCS“) conducted a public consultation from 8 October 2024 to 5 November 2024 seeking the public’s view on Singapore’s climate ambition, transition towards a low-carbon economy, and planned decarbonisation measures.

During the COP28 United Nations Climate Change Conference held last year, the first Global Stocktake was presented, in which countries and stakeholders evaluated their collective progress towards meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C. The outcome of the first Global Stocktake emphasised the urgency for decisive climate action to be taken within this decade. Following up, countries, including Singapore, are expected to align their Nationally Determined Contributions (“NDCs“) to recommendations of the Global Stocktake and communicate a revised NDC in 2025 with an end date of 2035.

Singapore had submitted its enhanced 2030 NDC and Long-Term Low Emissions Development Strategy to the United Nations Climate Change secretariat in 2020. Singapore has since increased its climate change ambition to reduce emissions to around 60 MtCO2e in 2030 and to achieve net-zero by 2050, following a public consultation in 2022. Public views from this 2024 consultation will help shape Singapore’s next revised NDC that will be submitted early 2025.

To meet the climate change ambition, Singapore is looking to achieve three transitions:

  1. Carbon transition to reduce emissions across all sectors. Singapore was the first country in Southeast Asia to introduce a carbon pricing scheme. The Government has also introduced a suite of measures to help companies improve energy efficiency, reduce emissions and seize opportunities in the green economy.
  1. Energy transition to achieve a resilient net-zero electricity grid. Power generation is a major source of carbon emissions, as Singapore currently relies heavily upon imported natural gas. To transform Singapore’s energy supply, Singapore is focusing on four levers:
    • Solar as main renewable energy source: Singapore will move forward with its solar deployment plans to achieve its target of at least two gigawatt-peak (“GWp“) by 2030.
    • Low-carbon electricity import: Singapore has raised its ambition and now seeks to import 6 gigawatts (“GW“) of low-carbon electricity by 2035. The Energy Market Authority has granted conditional licenses to five projects to import a total of two GW of low-carbon electricity from Indonesia. Additionally, conditional approvals have been granted to projects to import a total of 3.6 GW of low-carbon electricity from Indonesia, Cambodia and Vietnam.
    • Emerging low-carbon infrastructure and technologies: Carbon capture, utilisation and storage, low-carbon hydrogen (as outlined in the National Hydrogen Strategy 2022), and advanced geothermal systems are being explored to further reduced power sector emissions.
    • Natural gas as transitional fuel: Steps are being taken to work with the industry to improve the energy and carbon efficiency of natural gas generation units.
  1. Economic transition to remain competitive in a low-carbon future and to capture new green growth opportunities. The government has introduced opportunity areas such as clean technology, green information and communication technologies, test bedding, carbon services and trading, and climate risk management to incentivise entrepreneurship, research and development and The low-carbon shift across diverse economic sectors (e.g. manufacturing, trade, professional services, and finance) could introduce disruptions to existing business models or entire industries, necessitating that companies rethink their value chains and workforce competitiveness.

Given that Singapore’s decarbonisation journey requires a whole-of-nation approach, the public consultation sought to ascertain the public’s levels of awareness, levels of support and views on Singapore’s decarbonisation journey. Feedback was sought on:

  1. Singapore’s economic transition to a low-carbon economy and the positive impact on job creation, additional job skillsets required in the low-carbon economy, company decarbonisation incentives and whether companies should be faced with stronger disincentives to emit carbon.
  1. Singapore’s decarbonisation measures, including the carbon tax, carbon credits, importing low-carbon electricity, solar deployment, carbon capture and storage, industry energy efficiency measures, minimum energy performance standards, and adoption of cleaner energy vehicles. 
  1. Singapore’s climate commitments and the public’s interest in climate change issues, level of support for Singapore’s goal to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, and awareness and willingness to make behavioural changes to support Singapore’s climate commitments.

In our view, Singapore’s decarbonisation journey is inevitable and the Singapore government is investing significant efforts and financial resources, which means all businesses will be affected. At the same time, there are opportunities for new projects, infrastructure and technology. In the next revised NDC, Singapore is likely to further increase its climate change ambition.

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