task 2

When comparing Singapore and other countries in South East Asia, Singapore has mainly differences as compared to the other countries rather than similarities. One of such differences is the land area of Singapore as compared to the other countries. And in our reflection, we will focus on the differences between Singapore and other South East Asian countries, leading to different reactions to our research topic, which is the trust towards alternate resources of energy.
Differences
Singapore and Indonesia:
Indonesia is an example of a country that invested heavily on alternate sources of energy. Known to all, Indonesia is one of the largest producers of palm oil, which is extracted from palm oil trees as an alternate energy source to the use of fossil fuels. Besides relying heavily on alternate sources of energy, the people of Indonesia, as compared to the people of Japan, have yet to encounter any major incidents from their use of alternate energy resources. As much as the people of Japan lose faith in nuclear energy after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the people of Indonesia not only have not experienced any of such disasters, they also earned a large amount of income by exporting their palm oil to other countries. With the lack of incidents and also with money earned in return, the people of Indonesia will hardly find reasons to lose faith in their palm oil industry. Singapore on the other hand, has little experience in the use of alternate energy resources: they do not plant palm trees like Malaysia/Indonesia and they do not build hydroelectric plants like the Three Gorges Dam of China or the Hoover Dam in the United States of America. In conclusion, Singapore does not have the resources required to invest in the use of alternate resources and thus will of course not be able to enjoy any of its benefits nor suffer any consequences from possible incidents. The view of the people in Singapore towards alternate resources of energy will be mainly influenced by analysis from related experts, lessons learnt from other countries (the Fukushima nuclear disaster) or other sources of information. Due to the primary problem of land constraint and lack of experience in such matters, the view in Singapore can be easily influenced by any global happenings.
Singapore and Malaysia:
Our current research topic on energy sustainability pertaining to the impact of Fukushima Nuclear disaster on people’s confidence in usage of alternative forms of energy applies differently in the two countries. One important difference between Singapore and Malaysia is the total land size difference, it is obvious by viewing the world map and it will be really easy to compare the land are by both countries. Malaysia also has a population of only 27.5 million and although this is around 5x that of Singapore, we know that the land area of Malaysia is not merely 5x that of Singapore but much more. As a result, Singapore is much more densely populated than Malaysia, with much more people living in per unit area. Due to this, the people of Singapore will be more sensitive to building alternate sources of energy such as nuclear energy than the people of Malaysia. With the tragedy at the Fukushima nuclear reactor in Japan, the Singapore government, who once considered building a nuclear reactor, will have to reconsider because Singapore is severely constrained by limited land and if a similar nuclear disaster were to happen in Singapore, the consequences will be even more severe to a much smaller Singapore than Japan.