New ferry service to Southern Islands as part of Sentosa's sustainability plans

SINGAPORE: Getting to the Southern Islands from Sentosa could soon be a hop, skip and a jump away, with a new ferry jetty at Sentosa Cove Village expected to start services by December. 

Visitors to the Southern Islands, including St John's and Lazarus island, can look forward to “low-carbon leisure experiences”, including bicycle tours and glamping, and have food delivered to them via drones.

A new series of sustainability-themed tours which will take visitors through the unique heritage, biodiversity and nature of the Sentosa as well as neighbouring islands will also be progressively launched from December, said the Sentosa Development Corporation (SDC) in a media release on Friday (Sep 17).

It is part of the island’s efforts to become a carbon-neutral destination by 2030, and transform Singapore into a sustainable tourism destination.

On Friday, SDC launched a roadmap charting sustainability targets, which includes greening transport and infrastructure as well as harnessing renewable energy.

An electric beach shuttle at Sentosa. (Photo: Sentosa Development Corporation)

Come 2025, visitors to Sentosa will be zipped around the island in an all-electric fleet of vehicles, with electric buses to be progressively deployed in Sentosa from next year.

An electric bus trial with ComfortDelGro Bus will begin next month, said SDC. It added that by 2030, all SDC-owned car parks will also be electric vehicle charging enabled. And all new SDC-owned buildings will be constructed to attain Green Mark Platinum Super Low Energy (SLE) certification.

Speaking at the launch of Sentosa’s sustainability roadmap, Minister of State for Trade and Industry Alvin Tan said the roadmap was an “ambitious” step that Singapore has taken towards greening its tourism sector, adding that the model has the potential to be replicated to other sectors.

“As we proceed with our plans to transform Singapore in line with our Singapore Green Plan, such collaborations will be beneficial and necessary," he said. 

MORE COLLABORATION TO ACHIEVE CARBON NEUTRALITY

To achieve its goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030, a new alliance comprising of 17 businesses including SDC and major businesses in Sentosa such as hotels and beach clubs was launched on Friday.

According to SDC, the members collectively account for more than 90 per cent of the island’s estimated carbon profile of 162,000 tCO2e (tonnes carbon dioxide equivalent).

The alliance, called the Sentosa Carbon Neutral Network (SCNN), will develop Sentosa-wide sustainability solutions, through the sharing of resources and expertise, while also leveraging economies of scale and a common network to introduce large-scale solutions, said SDC.

These efforts include the development of green and sustainable events, as well as guidelines for reducing disposables.

SCNN will also invest in credible carbon offsets and imported renewable energy to neutralise the remaining carbon profile.

“Collectively with all our island partners, we can really push the limit on decarbonisation ... but there will always be residual carbon that we are unable to remove,” said Ms Thien Kwee Eng, SDC's CEO.

“I think we have to explore possible options around credits or energy imports, these are part and parcel of the consideration.”

Meanwhile, SDC said it will implement new infrastructure solutions for carbon mitigation, with a focus on studying solutions to harness renewable energy, such as solar and tidal energy, as well as waste-to-energy generation.

Collectively, these projects have the potential to generate sufficient renewable energy annually to offset the emissions of approximately 300,000 hotel room nights, said SDC.

This article was originally published on 17 September 2021.

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