Kota Samarahan, 6^th September 2019: Centre for Renewable Energy (CREN) Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS) won an award at the 37th ASEAN Ministers on Energy Meeting at Bangkok, Thailand, recently.

CREN UNIMAS received the award in the Renewable Energy - Off Grid Power category for a project entitled Development of Micro Hydro Project for Kampung Assum, Padawan, Sarawak.

Kampung Assum is home to about 35 Bidayuh families and with a population of about 450 people doing agricultural activities as as their main source of income.

The village was initially not connected to the electricity grid, forcing it to rely on costly diesel-powered generators for power.

CREN UNIMAS, through a grant from the Ministry of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change (MESTECC) or formerly known as the Ministry of Energy, Green Technology and Water (KeTTHA) completed a design and build the project to provide the basic hydroelectric power supply of 10kW + 5kW systems in 2017.

The free electricity generated from the micro hydro system is used for agricultural food processing activities managed by the community as additional source of income with part of the income to be used for the system ...