“Is Singapore government doing enough to
address the issue of climate change?”
Goldin mentioned in his TED talk that due
to the globalization, several problems have evolved; one of the many problems
that he mentioned was global climate change. Climate change is the result of an
increase in the average temperature and the rise in sea level. Most countries
suffered as a result of this phenomenon. One of the main causes of climate
change is the increasing amount of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, emitted
through human activities. With globalization, countries undergo
industrialization and development, leading to an increase in fossil fuel combustion,
which generates large amount of greenhouse gases.
Singapore is a small country, and we are
more susceptible to changes. Singapore’s temperature had increased by 0.2
degrees celcius since 1948 and mean sea level of the straits of Singapore had
also increased since then. Singapore’s carbon dioxide emission is less than 0.2%
of the world’s carbon emission, however, it is still important for Singapore to
have measures to lower the carbon emission to lower the effects of climate
change even though it is not very significant. This is because climate change
is not a problem that could be solved by one country; it requires all the
countries to come together to play a part in helping to address this global
issue. As a result, Singapore government had come up with several solutions to
address the issue of climate change, however, they are not sufficient.
Singapore had switched from using fuel
oil or coal to using natural gas as the main fuel for electricity. Natural gas
emit lesser amount of carbon dioxide as compared to fuel oil. The power sector
emits large amount of carbon dioxide in Singapore; with the use of natural gas,
there will be significant drop in the amount of carbon dioxide emitted. However,
this solution is only effective to a certain extent. It is effective as natural
gas is the cleanest fossil fuel and it generates far less carbon dioxide as
compared to oil or coal. It is not very effective in the long run as natural
gas is a non-renewable resource, it will not be sustainable to use natural gas
for a long period of time to generate electricity.
Transportation is another factor that
causes carbon emissions in Singapore. Singapore government has several policies
for transportation to lower the carbon emissions. Private cars contributed the
largest share of carbon emissions by the transport sector at 35%. Thus, there’s
a need to lower the number of private cars in Singapore. The government has a
vehicle quota system, which limits the number of private cars on the road in
Singapore. In addtion, all new cars owners have to bid for the Certificate of
Entitlement (COE) in order to purchase a new car. However, I feel that even
with this policy being imposed in Singapore, it is not effective. As most
Singaporeans have the mindset that it is important to own a car in Singapore,
even with the high COE, there will still be Singaporeans purchasing the cars.
It is hard to lower down the usage of private cars and encouraging them to
change to public transport.
Apart from implementing the COE, in 2013,
Singapore had been promoting the use of green vehicles in Singapore where these
vehicles generally emit less carbon dioxide. The Singapore government came out
with Carbon Emissions-based Vehicle (CEV) Scheme to encourage Singaporeans to
purchase green vehicles instead of the normal vehicles. CEV works by giving
rebates to users when they buy cars that emit lesser carbon dioxide while cars
that emit high amount of carbon dioxide would be charged. However, I feel that
this is not effective. Even with the increase government’s efforts to come up
with such schemes to encourage more car users to buy green vehicles, these vehicles
are still not popular in Singapore. These vehicles are generally more expensive
even with the rebates givem and Singaporeans have limited awareness of how
these green vehicles work and are doubtful about it. Thus, they would choose to
get the normal vehicles instead.
The industry sector in Singapore produces
the largest amount of carbon emissions. In order to lower the amount of carbon
emissions produced by the industry sector, Singapore government came out with a
few schemes that helps promote energy efficiency in companies. Taking for
example, the Grant for Energy Efficiencies Technologies (GREET), which is a
investment allowance scheme where the government will fund energy-intensive
industries to allow them to come up with technologies that can be
energy-efficient, and in the long run, also helping them to be more
cost-efficient. I feel that this can be effective as when firms are engaged in
these schemes, not only, they can help to lower the carbon emissions, but they
can also benefitted economically. However, constant fundings to companies would
deplete government’s fundings where they can channel these funds to other
areas.
In conclusion, I feel that Singapore is
not doing enough to address the issue of climate change even with the different
policies and schemes that the government has. The government can improve the
current policies to further helps to lower carbon emissions in Singapore.
Reference:
- https://app.nccs.gov.sg/page.aspx?pageid=160&secid=157
- http://www.lta.gov.sg/content/ltaweb/en/roads-and-motoring/owning-a-vehicle/costs-of-owning-a-vehicle/tax-structure-for-cars.html
No comments:
Post a Comment