Singapore unveiled on 10 February the Singapore Green Plan 2030 to build a sustainable future, advance the goals of the Paris Agreement and the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, and position itself to achieve its long-term net-zero emissions aspiration as soon as viable.
ASEAN member state Singapore plans to halve by 2050 its emissions that are expected to peak in 2030, with a view to achieving net-zero emissions as soon as viable in the second half of the century.
The Green Plan 2030 will rest on five pillars: create a green city, reduce carbon emissions, use cleaner energy, seek green growth opportunities to create new jobs, and build up Singapore’s climate resilience and food security.
The key targets of the plan include Singapore planting 1 million more trees, quadrupling solar energy deployment by 2025, and tapping green energy sources from the ASEAN region and beyond, through electricity imports.
The cleaner energy drive will also include a 2040 vision to phase out internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles, and have all vehicles run on cleaner energy. Singapore will require all newly-registered cars to be cleaner-energy models from 2030. In order to support the growth of electric vehicles (EVs), Singapore is more than doubling its EV charging points target—from 28,000 to 60,000 by 2030.
As part of the green economic growth in the plan, Singapore will introduce a new Enterprise Sustainability Programme to help enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), embrace sustainability and develop capabilities in this area.
Singapore targets to create business and job opportunities in sectors such as green finance, sustainability consultancy, verification, credits trading, and risk management.
“We are making good progress in green finance. It enables us to drive climate action by mobilising global capital and channelling it to areas such as renewable energy, battery technology, smart grids and other green businesses,” the government said.