Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
other countries (2.8%). The total electricity production amounted to 160,062 Gi-
gawatt hours (GWh) (DEDE 2008). For transportation, almost 80% of energy
consumption was used in land transportation, whilst 78.6% of the energy was
used by cars and light/heavy trucks, and only 0.5% by rail; transportation by wa-
terway accounted for only 4.6%, and the remaining 16.3% was for air transpor-
tation (EPPO 2008b).
The number of newly registered vehicles in Thailand had been increasing stead-
ily; in 2007, the number of vehicles reached 25.6 million, a 3% increasing from
24.5 million in 2006 (DLT 2008). The Ministry of Energy reported that the coun-
try consumed about 730,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (116 Million litres
per day). Bangkok alone consumed 44% while Thailand's remaining 75 provinces
accounted for 56% of total oil consumption. If Bangkok is able to reduce its oil
consumption and use more alternative energy, the country can save significant
money from reduced oil imports (Chatkaew 2008). Currently, 85-90% of oil is
imported and this high dependency on imported energy, aside from causing a
susbtancial loss of foreign currency, puts Thailand at risk of energy supply disrup-
tion and volatility of energy prices and threatens its competitiveness.
This together with quadrupling of the world oil price during the past 5 years has
pushed the cost of Thailand's net energy import to $19.5 billion in 2007, equiva-
lent to 7.9% of GDP (Amranand 2008). In 2001, due to the growing number of
cars, passengers using the mass transportation in Bangkok and its vicinities de-
creased from 1,224 million in 1997 to 938 million. In addition, passengers using
inter-province buses reduced from 12.6 million in 1997 to 10.8 million in 2001.
Likewise within the same period, passengers using rail transport dropped from
64.9 million to 56.7 million (EPPO 2008b). In comparison, the main transporta-
tion system in urban cities in developed countries, for example Germany and Ja-
pan, is the rail system, which is promoted by the governments due to its energy ef-
ficiency.
In 2003, Thailand faced such a risk of oil supply disruption and price volatility
that the government had to introduce an oil price stabilization measure in order to
alleviate the impacts of oil price hikes on the economic development as well as
domestic consumers. The country's push to strengthen the national energy security
and competitiveness comprised development strategies focused very much on ef-
ficient energy management and promotion of renewable energy. This was coupled
with strategies to extend the availability of indigenous energy reserves for as long
as possible. Thailand has limited indigenous fossil fuel reserves and at the rate of
consumption as of 31 December 2009, it was estimated that the country's crude oil
resources would dry up within the next 3-15 years; condensate within 8-22 years;
natural gas within 10-27 years, and; lignite within 67-114 years (EPPO 2009) (see
Table 10.1
). Several efforts and initiatives have been implemented to make the
country energy self-reliant. The balance between the energy consumption, energy
production, and energy intensity are key determinant factors in enhancing Thai-
land's national energy security and economic development.
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