SARAWAK could start supplying power to Sabah in either 2020 or 2021, as state-owned power company Sarawak Energy Bhd (SEB) takes another step to making its Borneo grid closer to becoming a reality.

SEB chief executive officer Sharbini Suhaili said power exchange agreements on the sale would be signed in the next few months and the sale would start when its northern grid was completed in 2020.

Sarawak’s most northern districts, Limbang and Lawas, are not connected to the state’s power grid at the time, and SEB is currently laying a transmission line from Miri to the areas.

The transmission line will skirt Brunei and the Brunei territory of Temburong.

Sharbini, in his media business update today, said the amount of electricity to be sold had yet to be determined but earlier media reports stated Brunei had agreed to purchase 100 megawatts (Mw) with an option to buy 50Mw more.

“It’s under discussions at the moment and it depends on how much power we can spare.

“We don’t expect to know that until we have our northern grid around 2020,” he said.

Sharbini also said SEB was also in discussions with Brunei on similar sales and was exploring hydro project opportunities in North Kalimantan.

He said the sale to Brunei could take place in the next couple of years.

“We are focusing in the next couple of years on Kalimantan and the opportunities there are for us in hydro projects.”

That include working on a partnership with Kalimantan on jointly undertaking power generation projects, like on the development of hydroelectric dams.

SEB and Kalimantan Utara had reportedly in 2016 formalised an agreement to jointly work on the province’s energy-rich resources for commercial and industrial development.

Sarawak has been exporting between 150Mw and 200Mw of electricity since 2016 to west Kalimantan, under an agreement signed in 2012 with Perusahan Listrik Negara Persero – an Indonesian government-owned corporation which has a monopoly on electricity distribution in Indonesia.

SEB commenced with an initial export of 50Mw soon after the commissioning of the 275kV interconnection linking Mambong in Sarawak and Bengkayang in West Kalimantan in January 2016.

The amount to be exported is expected to gradually increase to 230Mw.

SEB is also looking for hydro project opportunities in Myanmar as the company aims to realise its regional ambition for an Asean grid.

Sharbini however said SEB is “not moving very fast to Myanmar but it is something we are looking for the future”.

Sarawak’s current generation capacity is 4,652 Mw with 74% generated by hydro, 13% by gas, 10% by coal, 2.4% by diesel, 0.3% “alternative energy” and 0.9% “off-grid diesel”.

The capacity, Sharbini said, is expected to increase to 5,449Mw by 2020 and 7,115Mw by 2025 when the proposed 1,285Mw Baleh dam is commissioned. – March 21, 2018.