A 200 acre Biofuel Integrated Environmental Park is to be built Malaysian State of Perak at a cost of $400 million, it was announced last week. The project, a joint venture between the Perak State Government and Earth Biofuel (Asia) Sdn Bhd, will involve 900,000 carbon credit, a centralized treatment system for 4000 m3/hr industrial & biological waste water, methane gas recovery for 300,000 tonne/year landfill and R&D cum Training Centre generating about 30,000 jobs related to the project.

According to a State Government source, “We have to look beyond our dependence on polluting fossil oil, especially in the area of power utility in our industrial sector, and the proposed biofuel industrial park, with its own self sufficient source of electricity and steam will not only achieve this, but will utilize our State based renewable energy source – biodiesel from our own crude palm oil, rice husk, waste woodchips, waste palm sludge and waste cooking oil.

"This facility will be a showpiece industrial park, with investors enjoying total self-sufficient renewable energy sources, arising from its own on-site based biofuel plants, such as its Biodiesel plant, Biomass Co-generation Steam & Electricity Plant, Waste Liquid and Semi-solid Waste Treatment Plant, Biogas Methane Power Plant from biodegradable wastes and will also house the country’s first Biofuel Training Centre with Employment specializing in all related technologies & operations of the Park .”

This project is set to be launched simultaneously with two other similar projects in other Malaysian States of Pahang, and Terengganu. The projects are all slated to commence in 2008.