Eco-Business

EB Studio Indonesia will still be using coal by 2060, alongside emerging energy sources such as hydrogen and ammonia, policymakers said at an event in Jakarta. Indonesia has the potential to be a regional renewables powerhouse, but barriers such as fossil fuel subsidies are slowing the transition.

Adopting renewables and electricity imports adds to security concerns posed by global gas market volatility. Investors’ cold shoulder towards fossil energy could also threaten the longevity of Singapore’s gas plants, analysts say.

The ExxonMobil-NTU-A*STAR Corporate Lab was launched in April

Students from Singapore's Nanyang Technological University says there is a conflict of interest in the oil major's involvement in a project that claims "to help build a more sustainable future," and point to the firm's checkered history on climate. NTU and Exxon have defended the lab, saying it supports the green energy transition.

A growing number of pressures is pushing CSOs to the limit as the sustainability function expands and evolves. Eco-Business investigates burnout among sustainability leaders and asks if there is a remedy.

By Robin Hicks and Vincent Tan

By Robin Hicks

By Liang Lei

By Samantha Ho

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Moving in the opposite direction from the rest of the world, Indonesia plans to lower its renewable energy ambitions by 2030. The new governing administration needs to make effort to ensure that even the reduced targets are met. By Mutya Yustika

Non-populist policies pose risks for politicians. Prabowo Subianto, who has claimed victory in the Indonesian presidential elections, is looking at creating five million green jobs, but stops short of pledging to phase out fossil fuels subsidies. By Anissa R. Suharsono and Yanuar Nugroho

The Just Energy Transition Partnership is not the triumph the current president claims it is. It is a debt trap. The new president should turn their back on a flawed energy transition legacy and adopt a bolder path towards net-zero that leaves no one behind. By Firdaus Cahyadi

Two Indonesian girls hover over a laptop in a part in Sumenep, Madura, an island north east of Java

Indonesia's soaring post-pandemic digital economy is being powered mainly by coal. The archipelago needs to find ways to decouple rapid data centre growth from carbon emissions. By Rafi Adis Subarna

By Christina Ng, Putra Adhiguna

By Muhamad Rosyid Jazuli and Penlope Yaguma

By Nguyen Khac Giang

By Monika Merdekawati, Jason Jimmy Amadeus Palenewan and Beni Suryadi

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Gaurav Sant, founder of startup SeaChange, tells Eco-Business about a technology he hopes will give the world's oceans the capacity to absorb additional carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Jovie Montajes, founder of Light of Hope PH

After 20 years without electricity, more than 50 households in Cebu's poorest district have been provided with solar energy, financed by carbon offsets.

Air-conditioning units on a building in Singapore

Improving energy efficiency could meet a quarter of Southeast Asia’s emissions reduction targets. Here is how efficiency could drive Southeast Asia's energy transition.

Vietnam's wind market is thriving, but more work lies ahead if the country wants to power its booming economy without imperilling its people and the planet.

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The oil and gas sector needs to cut operational emissions faster, Charlotte Wolff-Bye tells the Eco-Business podcast. But slashing fuel output won’t do for the Asian supplier, and it welcomes respectful debate at the climate summit.

"We are already at 1.1°C of warming – a matter of life and death for the Global South", says Professor Winston Chow, the recently appointed co-chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's working group on impacts, adaptation and vulnerability.

The Singapore scientist, recently elected to the UN's top climate body, tells the Eco-Business Podcast about the precarious state of climate adaptation in developing Asia. The region is not well-prepared to manage the cascading risks of extreme climate events, he says.

In a region where large hydro projects and expanding biofuel plantations coincide with an upcoming coal phaseout, a laissez-faire approach could worsen existing inequalities and mar the success of a clean energy buildout.

Pretending to be an ESG guru while actually knowing little or nothing about environmental or social issues is known as competency greenwash

Former Monetary Authority of Singapore sustainability chief Darian McBain and recruiter Paddy Balfour tell the Eco-Business podcast why people are exaggerating their ESG expertise and why that's a problem in a key region for sustainable development.

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