Assessment of the Malaysian Tidal Stream Energy Resources

Abstract

As a developing country, Malaysia has shown great interest and effort to commit and invest for green technology and green energy especially tidal energy resources. This research project is conducted to carry out an assessment study to analyse and compare several locations in Malaysia while using the optimal analytical approach in finding the best sites to harness tidal stream resource around Malaysia. Previous studies that only considered flow velocity at the deployment sites may not be accurate since geometry of the coastal region and the friction force exerted from the tidal flow with the seabed can also contribute to the suitability of the proposed tidal sites. Tidal Model Driver was used to extract tidal elevation data on specific harmonic constituents and tidal velocity attribute, and then compared to the data obtained from General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans. The weighted decision matrix was used to analyse the potential of each location by considering essential criteria such as tidal velocity, depth of coastline, geometry of coastline and environmental impacts. Top locations with the highest score were chosen as potential location to invest in a tidal energy farm, which consists of Pulau Pangkor, Port Dickson, and Pulau Tioman among others. The locations that produce the highest yearly energy density are found to be Pulau Pangkor with 1.21 MWh/year followed by Pulau Pinang with 836.5 kWh/year. Notably, the inclusion of other factors besides tidal velocity such as the site characteristic and the amount of potential impact to the environment provided different outcome than published materials in this field.