Kota Samarahan, 5th August 2019: Centre for Renewable Energy (CREN) Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) has been awarded the Renewable Energy - Off Grid Power - category at the National Energy Award, NEA 2019, for their participation entitled Development of Micro Hydro project for Kampung Assum, Padawan, Sarawak last night at  Kuala Lumpur.

Kampung Assum is home to about 35 Bidayuh families and with a population of about 450 people where it is quite normal for two or three families stay together in each house.

The village was initially not connected to the electricity grid, forcing it to rely on costly diesel-powered generators for power. CREN, through a grant of aboutRM 4M, from KeTTHA, completed a designed and build project to provide the basic hydroelectric power supply of 10KW + 5KW systems in 2017.

Today, Kampung Assum is already on grid and the micro hydro system is thereby connected to a small factory hall owned by the community that allows them to conduct income generation activities for the village with free power supply.

NEA 2019 was organized by the Ministry of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change (MESTECC) to give recognition ...