PETALING JAYA: Malaysia’s residential solar market has the potential to play a huge role in the country’s renewables scene, according to clean energy solutions company Plus Xnergy Holding Sdn Bhd.
“There is huge room for the market to grow as there are 3.2 million landed houses in Malaysia and there are only a few thousand that have adopted solar. These 3.2 million houses have the potential to adopt solar to generate clean energy to their town,” Plus Xnergy group CEO Ko Chuan Zhen (pix) told SunBiz.
In residential adoption, he believes the changing norms of working from home spurred on by the pandemic have enticed consumers to install solar panels as a mean to cope with the spike in their energy bill arising from working remotely.
Towards encouraging the adoption of solar power among residential customers, Ko studied the pain points of challenges involved and came up with the rent-to-own model, spreading the cost of ownership over five years.
Figures by the Sustainable Energy Development Authority’s Net Energy Metering 3.0 Rakyat revealed the quota aimed at residential uptake for 2021-2023 currently stands 20.75 megawatts (MW) out of the 100MW allocated.
“To encourage residential consumers to embrace renewable energy (RE), we’d like to recommend the government to extend tax savings to them, similar to what is afforded to businesses,” Ko said.
Under this incentive, individuals can apply for tax savings for their solar photovoltaic installation just like those provided for electronic devices such as computers and mobile phones.
On the whole, Ko sees the incentives and policies offered by the government in positive light, noting the good and efficient policies that have been introduced in the past such as the green investment tax allowance and capital allowance on RE investment are being retained. Businesses can enjoy up to 48% in savings in capital with these two incentives.
Weighing in on quick uptake of Net Energy Metering 3.0’s Net Offset Virtual Aggregation programme quota, he estimates the market has the capacity to fill one to two gigawatts (GW) given the strong demand for RE.
“With the rise of environmental social governance compliance and carbon neutral initiative introduced by Bursa in the past few years, many listed companies has seen it as a push factor to go green. At the same time, there is also an impetus to do so from a balance sheet perspective due to the savings in their energy bills.” he said.
On the regulatory front, Plus Xnergy views the voluntary carbon market (VCM) as a good direction for RE, as it is a proven catalyst overseas. The introduction of such mechanism has led the transformation of Fortune 500 companies to RE100 companies with the goal of having zero carbon emission.
Ko believes the VCM will be able to stimulate people to go green and adopt sustainable business practices.
He said it is not just about compliance but it also offers tangible benefits as carbon credits in the mechanism act as commitment to lower a business’ energy consumption.
On regional prospects, the CEO sees huge potential in Vietnam, where Plus Xnergy has established a footprint, due to the high energy consumption and the large number of industrial areas in that country.
“This is something we are developing over the years but the pandemic has slowed our progress.”
Apart from that, Ko is excited to look for opportunities in Southeast Asia once the borders open up.
“Right now, our focus is still in Malaysia. Plus Xnergy has a variety of offerings here, helping our customers to build solar power plants, converting commercial buildings into solar-powered buildings.”
Source: The Sun Daily
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