Malaysia’s NDC aims to reduce the GHG emissions intensity of its GDP by 45% by
2030, relative to the emissions intensity of GDP in 2005. The first 35% of this reduction is unconditional. The final 10% is conditional on climate finance, technology transfer and capacity-building to be provided by developed countries.

For Malaysia to be on a 1.5°C compatible trajectory, its NDC would need to target GHG emissions reductions of around 57% below 2015 levels or to be around 141 MtCO₂e/yr (excluding LULUCF) by 2030. This stands in contrast with its current conditional NDC targeting a reduction of GHG emissions of 8% above 2015 levels, equivalent to 349 MtCO₂e/yr excluding LULUCF, which is close to double the emissions levels required to meet a 1.5°C pathway in 2030. With international support, Malaysia will be able to implement a 1.5°C compatible domestic emissions pathway and close the gap between its fair share level and modelled domestic emissions level.

Long term pathway

Malaysia does not have a long term emissions reduction target, although a Long-term Low Emissions Development Strategy is currently under development.¹ A 1.5°C compatible pathway would require GHG emissions to reduce by 85-90% below 2015 levels by 2050 (or 33-48 MtCO₂e/yr by 2050).¹⁸ On the road to net zero, the country will need to balance its remaining GHG emissions through the use of carbon dioxide removal approaches such as land sinks.

While the government projects a net sink under a “business as usual” scenario, this appears unrealistic compared to the historical LULUCF net emissions of 127 MtCO₂e/yr from 2001-2020.^2,19 Malaysia will need to implement more ambitious LULUCF policies, that would amongst others, address deforestation, which has resulted in the loss of 278 thousands hectares of forests in 2021.

All analysed 1.5°C scenarios show substantial decreases in emissions across all sectors. Some scenarios show that energy efficiency and electrification will be key in the decarbonisation of transport and industry sectors.

¹ The Edge Markets. Environment ministry to develop LT-LEDS for UNFCCC consideration. The Edge Markets. (2021).

² Global Forest Watch. Malaysia Interactive Forest Map & Tree Cover Change Data. (2021).

³ WWF. Deforestation Fronts, Drivers and Responses in a Changing World. (WWF, 2021).

⁴ Malaysia Government. Report on Peninsular Malaysia Generation Development Plan 2020 (2021 – 2039). (2021).

⁵ IEA. Malaysia. International Energy Agency. (2021).

⁶ Ministry of Environment and Water. Malaysia Third Biennial Update Report to the UNFCCC. (2020).

⁷ Greenpeace. Southeast Asia Power Sector Scorecard.(2020).

⁸ British Malaysian Chamber of Commerce. BMCC Sector Report 2018/2019: Oil, Gas & Energy. (2018).

⁹ Susskind, L. et al. Breaking Out of Carbon Lock-In: Malaysia’s Path to Decarbonization. Front. Built Environ. 6, 21 (2020). doi:10.3389/fbuil.2020.00021/full

¹⁰ KeTTHA. Green Technology Master Plan Malaysia 2017-2030. (2017).

¹¹ Mustapa, S. I. & Bekhet, H. A. Analysis of CO2 emissions reduction in the Malaysian transportation sector: An optimisation approach. Energy Policy 89, 171–183 (2016).

¹² Shaikh, P. H. et al. Building energy for sustainable development in Malaysia: A review. Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 75, 1392–1403 (2017).

¹³ Suruhanjaya Tenaga (Energy Commission). Malaysia Energy Statistics Handbook 2019. (2019).

¹⁴ PIK. The PRIMAP-hist national historical emissions time series. (2021).

¹⁵ Lee, J. Affordable EVs in Malaysia – how cheap can electric cars be priced with zero import, excise and road tax? (2021).

¹⁶ Malaysia Government. Malaysia Third National Communication and Second Biennial Update Report to the UNFCCC. (2018).

¹⁷ Using Global Warming Potential AR4.

¹⁸ While global cost-effective pathways assessed by the IPCC Special Report 1.5°C provide useful guidance for an upper-limit of emissions trajectories for developed countries, they underestimate the feasible space for such countries to reach net zero earlier. The current generation of models tend to depend strongly on land-use sinks outside of currently developed countries and include fossil fuel use well beyond the time at which these could be phased out, compared to what is understood from bottom-up approaches. The scientific teams which provide these global pathways constantly improve the technologies represented in their models – and novel CDR technologies are now being included in new studies focused on deep mitigation scenarios meeting the Paris Agreement. A wide assessment database of these new scenarios is not yet available; thus, we rely on available scenarios which focus particularly on BECCS as a net-negative emission technology. Accordingly, we do not yet consider land-sector emissions (LULUCF) and other CDR approaches which developed countries will need to implement in order to counterbalance their remaining emissions and reach net zero GHG are not considered here due to data availability.

¹⁹ LULUCF emissions are projected to be -227 MtCO₂e in 2030 following a business-as-usual scenario reported in Malaysia’s Second Biennial Report.

²⁰ As stated in the NDC. However, Malaysia participated in the Clean Development Mechanism and Voluntary Carbon Market, but these are not accounted as national mitigation actions as noted in the Biennial Report 3.

²¹ Fuel-efficient vehicles is defined as hybrid, electric vehicles and alternatively fuelled vehicles such as Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), biodiesel, ethanol, hydrogen and fuel cell.

²² The total financial support required totals USD 71,900,000, in additional to technical and capacity building support.

²³ In some of the analysed pathways, the energy sector assumes already a certain amount of carbon dioxide removal technologies, in this case bioenergy carbon capture and storage (BECCS).