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Global Journal of Engineering Science And [Karunakaran, 2(6): June, 2015] ISSN 2348 – 8034 Impact Factor- 3.155 GLOBAL JOURNAL OF ENGINEERING SCIENCE AND RESEARCHES THE OPTIONS AND DESIGN IMPROVEMENTS OF THE ELECTRIC GRID OF SARAWAK AS AN EXAMPLE FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIES Prashobh Karunakaran Senior Lecturer, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Sarawak, Malaysia ABSTRACT This research is a reference for decision makers of electric grids especially in developing countries. This is done by describing the 90 year old Sarawak electric grid, including design improvements to further enhance it. The grid includes the power plants, the substations and the transmission and distribution lines. Grid equipment (notably power stations) is so expensive that only politicians of the highest level can make decisions regarding them. The problem is only a few engineers are in politics. Therefore there is a need for an easily accessible scholarly paper on the power system options for developing countries. Keywords: Sarawak, electric grid, options, developing countries, design. I. INTRODUCTION Electric grids are already one of the most expensive installations in the world; currently tagged at six trillion dollars. The grid will grow by 44% from 2008 to 2030 and much of this will be in developing countries [1]. On the other hand engineers have tended to stay away from politics all over the world. Warnings about this problem have been made by many top thinkers because this situation cannot carry on as high technology increasingly becomes an inherent part of economic activities of any country [2]. Engineers with extensive field experience must be among the top decision making bodies of any country [2]. In some countries like China, top engineers are just picked to be politicians but in a democracy, engineers have to be cajoled to leave their comfort zones and become politicians for the good of society [2]. An example of how disasters can occur if engineers are not decision makers is the construction of the Banqiao hydroelectric dam in China. The main engineer (hydrologist), Chen Xing was pushed out of the project by politicians because he was vocal about the design. But when the dam finally burst in 1975 killing 171,000 people, politicians called him back to rebuild the dam and now China is the world leader in dam construction with the largest hydroelectricity generation in the world [3]. The power system of Sarawak, Malaysia was studied and designs were formulated to optimize it further as a reference model for other developing countries. Sarawak is the largest state of Malaysia (at 124,450 km²) but with a population of only 2.5 million. The state is located on the equator and therefore has a rainfall of about 4000mm (157 inches) per year compared to a USA average of just 715mm (28 inches) [4]. The topography is of high mountain ranges at the border with Indonesia, with ridges up to 1,200 meters high [5]. The rare combination of all these four factors of large land area, low population density, high rainfall and mountains ranges makes development of hydroelectricity ideal for Sarawak. Added to this, other clean sources of energy are not optimal for equatorial Sarawak. It is for this reason that Sarawak has already built three dams and ten more are in the planning stages. The exploitable potential of hydroelectricity in Malaysia is 123 TWh per year and 70% of this or 86 TWh lies in Sarawak [6]. Sarawak's hydroelectricity resource was studied by the SAMA Consortium. This Consortium came as a technical aid to Malaysia, granted by the German government, via the German Agency for Technical Co-operation (GTZ). A total 51 dam sites were identified, each with a potential to generate more than 50 MW. Their combined hydroelectric generation potential is 20,000 MW [6]. Sarawak faces the same geopolitical situation of many developing countries where decision makers are influenced by big trends in developed countries. Among these trends are the developments of solar and wind power sources. The problem is wind and solar are good options for the Northern and Southern hemisphere but bad for equatorial countries. Solar is not suitable for a country where cloud cover and blue sky comes and goes many times within the day. Power companies need to be able to predict the availability of power. The problems of solar in cloudy countries is 161 (C)Global Journal Of Engineering Science And Researches [Karunakaran, 2(6): June, 2015] ISSN 2348 – 8034 Impact Factor- 3.155 explained by solar development in Hawaii where dependence on solar power damaged grid equipment because a cloud cover can take out 70 to 80 percent of power output in less than a minute. Other than hydroelectricity, no other power stations can load the grid or backup this loss that fast. Thus the other power stations in Hawaii and switchgears were damaged as the load drew all their demand from the remaining diesel engines and gas turbines [7]. Decision makers should study carefully the local resource advantage of their country before embarking on expensive electric power projects. Just as solar power will work best in sunny Saudi Arabia and wind power will work best in the windy Norwegian seas, hydro power is the most suitable option for the high rainfall equatorial Sarawak. The dams also help control flooding; a good example is the city of Sibu, Sarawak. Sibu was a city infamous for it’s flooding but after the commissioning of the Bakun dam, flooding in the city is almost non-existent [6]. Sarawak needs to tap her hydroelectric resources despite the current low electric demand because cheap electricity is a magnet for large industrialist worldwide. It will bring about a more robust economy as well as reduce greenhouse gasses produced by global industrialists who are currently planning to use fossil fuels to power their growth. Global industrialists will always like to depict a low carbon footprint of their corporations. The argument about dams has been waging for some time. Some studies claim that the dams damages the environment [8] but if the dams are not built, hydrocarbon energy plant will be built to satisfy human needs somewhere in the world. Also people closest to the issue tend to support the development of the dams. The protesters against the dam are mainly people who are not affected by the dam but used by political agencies solely for the purpose of bringing down incumbents [9]. This is because dams are usually developed in very rural regions whose original inhabitant tend to be far behind in education and other developments. The dams will bring about road access, market for their produce and education for their children [9]. If fossil fuel power plants were used to achieve the equivalent economic development which hydroelectricity can foster in Sarawak, a huge amount of CO2 and other polluting gasses will have to be emitted. The effects of this emission are far worse than is caused by the initial inundation of land areas as shown in Table 1. In the Table, the last column shows that the CO2 emission if coal power plants were used to produce all the electricity generated in Sarawak. The third column shows the potential CO2 which can be absorbed by the lands inundated land by the dams [10]. Table 1: Effects of the dam inundated areas versus coal power The figures in Table 1 is derived from the coal power station in Kuching which is 1.056 tons CO2 emitted per MWh of electricity produced (US EIA published data is 1.085 tons of CO2 per MWh of electricity produced. Also used for the above table was EIA (U.S. Energy Information Administration) published data that 0.009999822 km2 of rainforest absorbs 1 ton of CO2 from the atmosphere [20,11]. II. LITREATURE REVIEW In 2013, 36 billion tons of CO2 was emitted to the atmosphere making it the highest yearly emission level in earth's history. 162 (C)Global Journal Of Engineering Science And Researches [Karunakaran, 2(6): June, 2015] ISSN 2348 – 8034 Impact Factor- 3.155 Figure. 1: World electric power generation by sources And about 32% of this CO2 is emitted by the electric power industry [11]. Of the total electricity generated in the world, 66% is generated with hydrocarbon sources, which breaks down to 40% from coal fired power stations, 22% by natural gas power stations and 4% by oil powered generation. Figure 1 show the world electric power generation by sources [12]. In summary, of the 32% CO2 emission produced by the electric industry, coal power stations emits 19%, gas power stations emits 11% and internal combustion engine (ICE) power station emit 2%. This 32% of total CO2 emission compares with 28% emitted by the entire transportation sector (cars, trucks, planes and ships). As global electricity consumption increases by 44% over the period 2008 to 2030 the corresponding increase in CO2 emission will cause a much higher rate of global warming caused disasters, the likes of the blizzards of New York in 2015, the hurricane Sandy in 2012, the Queensland, Australia floods in 2010 and the floods in Malaysia in 2014. All these disasters were never seen before events and most scientists attribute them to global warming [13]. The National Climatic Data Center of USA has reported that 2014 is the hottest year since humans started keeping records [14]. Thus developing countries which are just beginning to expand their electrical energy generation should bypass the previous mistakes of choosing high pollution energy sources. There should be optimization in power system options from the onset. Human beings inevitably need industrial production, the choice for humans is use highly polluting coal fired power plants or clean energy sources like hydroelectricity, wind or solar.
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