By SARAH HAFIZAH CHANDRA and NOOR SYAHHIRA HADY
KUCHING: There are several factors that influence the buzz surrounding carbon when it comes to climate change mitigation efforts.
Carbon expert, Dr Waseem Razzaq Khan, pointed out that people always question ‘why carbon’ when there are other greenhouse gases around.
He said carbon dioxide is a reference gas while other greenhouse gases are known as carbon dioxide equivalent.
“There are several factors that influence this including carbon dioxide’s dominance and volume in the atmosphere, its longevity and accumulation as well as ease of measurement and standardisation,” he said.
He said this during a one-day talk on ‘Understanding Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS)’ organised by the Commonwealth Journalism Association (CJA) today.
Waseem, who is from Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), also enlightened journalists on the difference between CCS, CCU and CDR.
He explained that CCS focuses on capturing carbon dioxide from industrial sources and storing it permanently, like underground.
“CCU also captures carbon dioxide, but instead of storing it, it uses it for various purposes, like creating new products, whereas CDR aims to remove carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere, creating negative emissions, and includes both technological and biological approaches,” he said.
Meanwhile, in another session, Fairatmos’ Senior Business Development and Climate Solution Specialist for Southeast Asia (SEA) Region, Zaky Naufal, said that nature-based solution (NBS) focuses more on forest conservation and forest planting among other things.
As such, he revealed that Sarawak recorded the highest NBS for carbon projects.
“A lot of mega companies prefer to support NBS because they know the impacts that they will be getting.
“They know that if they are supporting nature-based solution, there are going to be more SDG goals that can be acquired.
“Moreover, SDG goals open up a huge amount of business opportunity for them, such as international investment, national investment, good track record by the government, and essentially, if they are applying sustainability, then it’s a long run for them.
“This is because NBS, they require less energy, promotes inclusivity,” he said.
