A Research Platform for Singapore

Singapore's Pathway to Carbon Neutrality -Analysis of New Technologies

Overview

Singapore decided to comply with strict climate goals as articulated in the COP 26 agreement while keeping a flourishing economy. The objective of this project is to describe, model, evaluate, and rank alternative pathways to ultimately reach the goal of climate neutrality in Singapore in the next 30 to 50 years.

The focus of the work is on new necessary infrastructures to deliver energy to and from Singapore. The development is a competition between renewable and fossil primary energies, different supply regions and the final energy carriers. For each of the most promising sets of options, a scenario is developed in the project.

The specific research questions to be addressed in this project are: 

  1. What are rough estimates of the future energy needs in Singapore? 
  2. Which final energy carrier will dominate in future? What will the share of different energy carriers look like? 
  3. How will the maritime and aviation sectors be fuelled? 
  4. Where is the energy coming from: ASEAN, Australia, or Rest of the World? 
  5. What will the new infrastructure look like, how long will the implementation take? 
  6. What is the role of hydrogen or synfuels in the Singapore context? What is the value proposition of Singapore as a hydrogen hub? 
  7. Among the different pathways for hydrogen production and transport, which are the best options for Singapore for its own energy transition, and for its role as a potential hydrogen hub? 

Research

Three scenario families represent possible developments of Singapore’s energy system:

  • The first family assumes the development of a global market for hydrogen or synfuels with Singapore being a regional hub for the new energy carrier.
  • The second family assumes the intense cooperation of ASEAN countries in the field of energy. Transnational power or hydrogen networks form the backbone of the cooperation.
  • The third family remains in the fossil fuel paradigm but reduces emissions by CCU, CCUS or carbon production. Singapore is also here the central hub in the ASEAN region.

All three-scenario families investigate the possible role of biomass and biofuels in the ASEAN region as supplement for the other energy carriers. 

The project consists of four work packages. 

Work package 1 – Forecasting Singapore’s Future Energy Demand

This work package covers a detailed analysis of the demand sector in Singapore comprising residential sector, service sector, industrial sector, and transportation sector. The future demand of airport and harbour will be included as well. Annual demand as well as load curves for each sector will be derived giving time characteristics on an hourly basis. Scenario and sensitivity analysis will enlarge the scope of the investigation. 

Work package 2 – Energy Technologies for Transition

This work package discusses new technologies and analyses the energy pathways using these technologies, with a special emphasis on transport technologies and technologies to produce hydrogen. While the main characteristics of the new technologies are known, many missing details need to be evaluated by simulations. The areas to be covered in this work package are

  1. electricity transport from the ASEAN and APAC region,
  2. hydrogen production and transport,
  3. use and separation of carbon.  

Work package 3 – Modelling and Assessment of Renewable Potential for Singapore in ASEAN and Australia

This work package investigates the production and transport of renewable power and hydrogen from the ASEAN region or Australia to Singapore. Existing tools will be used and enhanced to

  1. analyse renewable potentials,
  2. determine the energy demand in the regions,
  3. modelling of a cost-optimal energy system,
  4. modelling of the transport infrastructure. 

Work package 4 – Evaluation of Singapore as a Hydrogen Hub

This work package develops a picture of Singapore in the world with global trade of green hydrogen and green synfuels. Results of the previous work packages are utilised for this evaluation. Several options for Singapore such as being a hub for green hydrogen or synfuels, or producer of hydrogen will be analysed. 

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