‘GET’ with the green programme

PETALING JAYA: More businesses are giving more emphasis to environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals set by the government, with over 40% of them subscribing to the green electricity tariff (GET).

Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) said the GET programme that started on May 3 has garnered significant interest from its customers, mostly in industrial and commercial sectors such as manufacturing, oil and gas, healthcare, telecommunications, retail, financial services as well as government institutions.

“Notably, the manufacturing sector has emerged as a leading adopter, contributing significantly to the programme’s initial success with over 2,200GWh (gigawatt-hours) or 33% of total capacity subscribed, as of the end of May 2024,” it said.

The GET programme is part of Malaysia’s energy transition strategy to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

“While green electricity is derived from renewable energy (RE) sources like solar power, complete reliance on them can be challenging due to limitations of rooftop space and available sunlight hours.

“GET helps subscribers overcome these hurdles effortlessly,” TNB told The Star.

However, in order to get 100% of electricity needs from RE sources, there’s a huge challenge for customers without enough rooftop space to put in enough solar panels, while effective sunlight hours per day on average is only about three to four hours, the company said.

But these challenges can be overcome through the GET programme as it allows customers to obtain indirect green electricity (without physical changes at the site) through the Renewable Energy Certificate (REC), an instrument to make claims for green electricity, it added.

With this, TNB said customers can achieve 100% green electricity effortlessly and meet their sustainability goals.

Electricity is one of the main contributors to an organisation’s carbon footprint. Every 1,000kWh (kilowatt-hour) contributes an estimated 0.758 tonnes of CO2 (as per 2021 data).

Switching to green electricity helps reduce this footprint and drive more renewable energy growth, said TNB.

Other benefits of GET include boosting the company ESG rating, affordability – for an effective premium of three sen per kWh, large businesses can achieve 100% green electricity– and stable rates, it added.