The Building Sector Energy Efficiency Project (BSEEP) is a national project to reduce the annual growth rate of greenhouse gas emission from the building sector in Malaysia. The project is supported by United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and funded by Global Environment Facility (GEF). Jabatan Kerja Raya (JKR), an agency under the Ministry of Works is the executing entity and implementing partner of the project.

The project is in line with the GEF’s climate change strategic program on Promoting Energy Efficiency in Residential and Commercial Buildings (SP-1). It is comprised of activities aimed at improving energy efficiency and promoting the widespread adoption of energy efficient building technologies and practices in the Malaysian Building Sector.

BSEEP strives to assist Malaysia to meet its commitments to reduce its CO2 emissions by 40% by the year 2020. This commitment made at the 15th Conference of Parties (COP 15) in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2009, was ambitious especially for the building sector in Malaysia.

Policy recommendations

SEEP has carried out work to assess the energy efficiency scenario in Malaysia and has come up with the following recommended strategy to drive the adoption of energy efficiency by the industry and public. These are: enable the market, create a stable financing mechanism, incentivise the market, have government lead by example, strengthen institutions, and monitor and evaluate.

Enabling the market:

• The Uniform Building By Laws, 2012, which incorporate energy efficiency provisions from MS 1525, need to be gazetted by the states and municipalities who have not done so in Malaysia (readers should note that only the state of Selangor has gazetted this).
• Energy usage and the opportunity provided by energy efficiency needs to become more visible through the mandatory disclosure of energy building performance. To enable this an energy efficiency rating tool for existing buildings which covers a range of building types needs to be available.
• A National Building Energy Consumption Database (NBECD) needs to be developed.
• Awareness should be raised through Appliance and Equipment Standards and Labelling (S&L) and expansion of the S&L program to cover commercial equipment, notably chillers and commercial air-conditioners.
• Subsidies on electricity prices should be totally removed.