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Alternative Sources of Energy – Bio-diesel from Waste Cooking Oil in

Singapore

Introduction

Despite being predominantly reliant on imported oil and natural gas, Singapore

has emerged as one of the most modernised and industrialised nations in South-East

Asia. However, this reliance and the very sustainability of dependence on fossil fuels

that are subject to unrelated factors and fluctuations in supply and cost makes it

essential for the country to examine alternative sources of energy.

According to Worldwatch Institute (2007), mobility is significant to the delivery of

goods, food, and services. Yet, the transportation infrastructure that runs today’s

economy is at risk because of its overwhelming reliance on fossil fuels. Fast depleting

petroleum fuels provide an estimated 95 percent of energy for global transport. The oil

reserves, found in a few countries many of them weighed down by economic and

political problems, make its sustainability questionable.

Bio-fuels compare favourably with fossil fuels in terms of sustainability because

they derive their energy primarily from renewable resources and because their use leads

to lower emissions of greenhouse gases and atmospheric pollutants (Beer et al, 2006;

SMTI, 2006). Nevertheless, the concept of the sustainability of bio-fuels has been

subject of much debate recently. An example is the study by Fargione et al (2008) that

analyses the carbon balance change resulting from the diversion of land resources from

farmlands, rainforests, grasslands etc to production of crops that yield bio-fuels. Their

study reports that land use change would create a carbon debt that would take anything

from 17 to 423 years to repay. The worst is the conversion of tropical rainforests in
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South-East Asia to palm plantations for palm oil. It would take 423 years for palm diesel

to become CO2 negative. The study (ibid) concludes that most bio-fuels produced from

virgin resources are not sustainable (see also Searchinger et al, 2008). On the other

hand, waste cooking oil (WCO) suffers from no such drawback since it uses a waste

product that otherwise creates a problem in effluent treatment.

Studies, thus far, have not addressed the quantity of WCO collected and processed

in Singapore but Pleanjai et al (2009) and Pascual and Tan (2004) have carried out such

studies for Thailand and Philippines respectively. In addition, considerable amount of

information and research is available on Singapore’s initiatives towards achieving

sustainability and independence by exploiting alternate energy resources.

This essay briefly analyses the existing situation of collection, conversion, and use

of WCO in Singapore to arrive at conclusions and recommendations for the way forward

for developing this resource as a sustainable alternative to petroleum based diesel.

Discussion

Speaking at the Institute of Asian Studies on July 26, 2010, Mr. Tan Yong Soon,

Permanent Secretary (National Climate Change), remarked that Singapore’s

contribution to the global carbon emissions is a “miniscule” 0.2 percent (GOS, 2010).

On the other hand, Singapore is likely to suffer the effects of global warming more as

oceans rise. Singapore has taken several initiatives to mitigate the effects of global

warming. One of these is the Sustainable Singapore Blueprint launched in 2009, which

aims to reduce the country’s energy intensity. The government also plans to enact the

Energy Conservation Act by 2013. However, the secretary noted that given the physical
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size of the country the possibility of exploiting other alternative sources of energy such

as wind, geothermal and tidal energies are relatively small. Solar energy holds some

promise and Singapore is making headway in exploiting this resource. The main

opportunity lies in bio-fuels.

The ‘Singapore Green Plan 2012’ targets reduction of CO2 by 25% over levels

existing in 1990 by 2012 (MEWR, 2006). The Energy Conservation Act aims a reduction

of 35% energy intensity by 2030 from 2005 levels across all sectors. Kothari et al

(2010:2) say that the negative effects of fossil fuel use include “global climate change,

world energy conflicts, and energy source shortages” and these “have increasingly

threatened world stability” affecting all levels of society. These effects are due to the

decrease in fossil fuel reserves and increasing demand, concern for global climate

change due to increased CO2 content in the atmosphere, and increase in the levels of

solid and liquid wastes from increasing world populations (ibid). In addition to CO2,

atmospheric pollution caused by the use of diesel vehicles has severe implications for

human health. Important pollutants are CO, NOX, volatile organics, SO2, and perhaps

the most important – Suspended Particulate matter (SPM). The NEA (2005) estimates

show that diesel vehicles contribute half of the SPM (less than 2.5 microns) in

Singapore.

In view of these difficulties, the idea of biodiesel as an alternative fuel has gained

importance because of the good quality of exhaust gases, sustainability, and

biodegradability (Atadashi et al, 2010). A number of vegetable oils such as soybean or

rapeseed oil are the main feedstock for biodiesel but the product is not cost-competitive

because of the high cost of the raw material, which contributes 60-80% of biodiesel cost
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(Pandey, 2008). On the other hand, the price of WCO is approximately 30%-60% of new

vegetable oil thereby implying that the cost of biodiesel from WCO is significantly lower,

conversion of waste oils also reduces the harmful effects of disposal through drains.

Atadashi et al (2010) say that the main advantage of biodiesel is its biodegradability,

and possibility for use in diesel engines without and modification to the engine. In

addition, they quote several research papers to show that emissions from engines using

biodiesel have low SO2 and net CO2 content, the reliance on renewable resources make

this a sustainable alternative to conventional petroleum diesel.

Obtaining the raw materials for bio-fuels is critical to the success of any

programme for conversion to the use of such fuels (Koizumi & Ogha, 2007). Present

technologies look at farm products to generate bio-fuels raising the food v/s fuel debate.

As it is, most Asian countries are net importers of food. Therefore, diversion of any of

the farm product from food to fuel use will result in an increase in food costs with many

attendant social problems. There is some discussion regarding second-generation bio-

fuels, which use biomass conversion of farm and forest wastes, as a possible way to the

future. However, as Paul and Ernsting (2008) point out commercially viable

technologies for production of bio-fuels are not available at present. Such technology

may not be available in time to avoid the near disastrous situation facing the world when

fossil fuel begins to run out (ibid). The environmental, social, and economic benefits

that might result from increased bio-fuel production in Singapore are subject to debate.

As an energy policy, it is doubtful that bio-fuel production will decrease Singapore’s

reliance on fossil fuels. Singapore would have to use 36 percent of its farmland to

produce enough bio-fuel to replace 10 percent of the fuel currently used in

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transportation. The rationale of allocating farmland to energy production rather than

food production is questionable. As a measure to lessen greenhouse gas emissions,

replacing five percent of predictable fuel with bio-fuels would have a relatively minor

impact on easing greenhouse gas emissions in Singapore as stated in (UNEP, 2009).

Chua et al (2010) state that biodiesel derived from Waste Cooking Oil (WCO) is a

highly sustainable alternative to fossil fuel that Singapore may exploit for benefit not

only in environmental and health aspects but also from the commercial viewpoint. WCO

is a waste, which raises the Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) of the effluent form

households and commercial cooking making treatment costlier. In addition, use of WCO

does not put any pressure on land conversion to grow crops that can yield virgin oil for

biodiesel manufacture. This aspect is especially important for Singapore, given its

limited land availability. These researchers (ibid) report their detailed findings from a

comparison of the environmental performance of biodiesel from WCO and low sulphur

diesel using the Life Cycle Energy Efficiency (LCEE) and Fossil Energy Ratio (FER)

methods. They report the following:

Energy Efficiencies Diesel Biodiesel

LCEE (%) 71.09 86.93
FER 0.74 9.39
(Source: Chua, Lee, and Low (2010): Table 3: pp. 422)

Their conclusion is that collection of WCO and its conversion to biodiesel for use in

Singapore holds a good potential for improvement in environmental sustainability.

However, we cannot allow these findings to paint too positive a picture because

other factors are also important. In 2006, Singapore consumed 1.4 million tons of diesel
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(IEA, 2006). Chua et al (2010) themselves report that in 2007 107,087 tons of cooking

oil was used in Singapore and estimate that about 18.5% of this can be recovered as

WCO putting the limit at about 19,800 tons annually (in 2007). Assuming a recovery of

99% (ibid), the potential to produce biodiesel from this source is about 19,500 tons,

which is 1.4% of the total consumption. This helps us put the discussion in perspective.

Reporting for the Strait Times on June 7, 2010, Lester Kok reports that only one

company, Alpha Biofuels supplies Biofuels in Singapore at present. This company plans

to produce and sell about 2000KL of bio fuel in 2010 from its eight outlets across the

island. Compared with the overall consumption, this represents a share that does not

represent even a fraction of one percent. A second company will commence operations

this year. This company, Fuelogical will produce about 1700KL and commence

marketing by September 2010. This company aims to collect and convert waste cooking

oils and waste products from palm oil refineries in Malaysia for conversion. Alpha’s

product offers not only a cleaner fuel that may be used instead of, or in combination

with petroleum diesel, but is also cheaper as it retails at $1.o7 as against current prices

of $1.70 for diesel and $1.80 for petrol. However, it does not compare favourably with

buying diesel in bulk, as it is 20% costlier. Additionally, getting companies and

households to donate waste cooking oil is difficult, as they prefer to sell to third-party

collectors who export it to other countries for sale as low-grade cooking oil. This report

brings an important issue to the fore, that of government intervention for protection of a

fledgling important industry through provision of subsidies/tax incentives and putting

an embargo on export of WCO.

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In addition to the efforts towards the recycling of WCO, Singapore will also witness

the commissioning of one of the world’s largest bio fuel plants in Tuas later this year.

Built at a cost of $930 million, the plant will have a capacity to produce 800,000 tons of

biodiesel. However, this plant will use fresh palm oil as feedstock making its product

more expensive than petroleum diesel. The company, Neste Oil plans to use the quality

of the product and the eco-friendly tag to market its product at a premium. It is virtually

impossible to collect WCO to the extent required by this plant for its feedstock

requirement is approximately one million tons compared to total consumption of two

million tons of cooking oil in Singapore, of which it is possible to recover only an

estimated 18-20%. Note that these figures do not match those provided by Chua et al

2010.

The Singapore government has identified solar energy as a first priority in its

energy security drive, followed by Biofuels, wind energy, tidal energy etc and hopes that

by 2015 the clean energy industry will add $1.7 billion to its GDP (MEWR, 2010).

However, as seen in the discussions above, the contribution these efforts will yield forms

a very small part of the total energy consumption on the island. Data on energy

consumption reveals that energy intensity (energy consumed per dollar of GDP) is

significantly high for Singapore compared with other developed countries. Figure 1

illustrates this.
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Figure 1: Energy Intensity

(Source: http://www.lowcarbonsg.com/tag/energy-consumption/ accessed August 15, 2010).

Similarly, if we look at per capita consumption the picture is similar (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Energy Consumption per Capita

(Source: http://www.lowcarbonsg.com/tag/energy-consumption/ accessed August 15, 2010).
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It is important to remember that the EIA data includes the bunker sales of fuel to

ships for international voyages and thus it does not represent the true picture of energy

consumption within Singapore. Efforts to reduce energy intensity have borne fruit as

evident from Figure 3 below. Significantly, Singapore has reduced its energy intensity by

nearly 15% between 1990 and 2005.

Figure 3: Energy Intensity Trends

(Source: http://www.aipasecretariat.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/Eg-Singapore-1-AIPA-Country-
Report-on-Clean-Energy.pdf accessed August 15, 2010).

Conclusion

From the discussions, one concludes that alternative sources of energy, especially

biofuels and biodiesel derived from waste cooking oils are emerging technologies that

have potential to help the country achieve energy security. However, these do no present

a significant alternative to fossil fuels and the answer may lie more in reducing energy

intensity and per capita consumption of energy. This philosophy will also help reduce

the carbon footprint, which is an essential part of the Kyoto protocol and the
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responsibility Singapore shares with other developed and developing countries

regardless of its very small share in greenhouse gas emissions.

Nevertheless, this does not to detract from the advantage of converting all the

waste cooking oil that Singapore can feasibly collect. In the absence of a viable

technology that offers substantial and sustainable alternatives to the use of fossil fuels

every effort made to reduce global warming and atmospheric pollution deserves credit.

Words 2198
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