Importance of palm biodiesel as a transportation fuel in Malaysia

摘要

The world today is faced with serious environmental pollution and global warming. Besides, fossil fuel will become rare and faces a serious shortage in the near future. This has triggered the awareness to find sustainable energy sources as alternative energy. Transportation has dominated global fuel consumption and greenhouse gas effects have risen at an alarming rate. In Malaysia, the transportation sector is the second largest energy consuming sector after the industrial sector, Gasoline and diesel consumption for road transport have a faster growing rate than other sector and the trend appeared to be moving rapidly upwards in the near future. This has caused much concern to improve the sustainable energy of this sector. Even though different alternative energy solutions have been put forward to reduce the dependency on fossil fuels, biofuels remain one of the few options which are capable of replacing the fossil fuels roles in the transportation sector without suffering from major economic losses. Palm oil is one of the most efficient oil bearing crops in terms of oil yield, efficiency, land utilization and productivity. As a leading producer of palm oil, Malaysia is intended to implement mandatory biodiesel blends in its transportation sector in order to balance the energy demand and achieve its carbon reduction commitment towards a more sustainable development. This article discusses the potential of palm oil-based biodiesel fuel and the current scenario of transportation sector development in Malaysia. The study found that there is an urgent need to adopt suitable energy policy to balance the energy demand and reduce emission in the transportation sector. It is hoped that this case study will enable the Malaysian government to achieve their renewable energy target in the transportation sector..