SINGAPORE – Record temperatures. Plastic bag charge. Rising water prices. These were some of the hottest and most significant local environment news stories of the year. Here is a snapshot of five of them.

1. Record heat and haze

On May 13 in Ang Mo Kio, the mercury spiked to 37 deg C, a temperature not felt in Singapore since 1983. The record heat came just months before El Nino, which brings hotter and drier weather, arrived in the region.

Forest fires in Indonesia’s Sumatra, coupled with El Nino and another weather phenomenon called the positive Indian Ocean Dipole, contributed to the return of transboundary haze during a weekend in October.

On Oct 7, air quality reached unhealthy levels for the first time since 2019, with the 24-hour Pollutant Standards Index reaching between 67 and 123 at 9pm.

Why it matters

2023 has been the hottest year on record, and the risk of more frequent haze episodes, scorching weather and even heatwaves in Singapore is not far from reality as the world boils.

Climate change could fuel more intense El Ninos, and people’s health will pay the price. A national heat stress advisory was launched in July to help people guard against heat-related illnesses.

Singapore did not face the full brunt of the haze in 2023 because rainfall soon cleared up the skies.

Indonesia had also been stepping up enforcement, firefighting and disaster management operations.

The next period with a higher haze risk will be during the south-west monsoon between June and October 2024.

2. Plastic bag charge

Since July, most supermarkets have been charging five cents for a plastic bag, in a nationwide push to cut shoppers’ reliance on disposables.

Many people have adapted to the change, with fabric bags and shopping trolleys becoming more of a common sight at shops.

Within a month of the charge, some supermarkets saw up to an 80 per cent drop in the number of plastic bags used.

Residents have also been urged to continue bagging their trash with alternatives such as produce bags and food packaging, instead of buying plastic bags.

Why it matters

The Republic had, for years, resisted introducing a mandatory charge for plastic bags, but there was a need to nudge Singaporeans away from a disposables-reliant culture.

Producing plastic bags is also energy-intensive and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions.

Switching from disposable carrier bags to biodegradable bags was not an option because Singapore’s waste is mainly incinerated.

The plastic bag charge is the first of several efforts to reduce the country’s waste and increase its low household recycling rate.

From April 2025, bottled and canned drinks will cost 10 cents more, but shoppers will get the deposit back once they return the empty cans and plastic bottles for recycling.

3. Higher water price and carbon tax

Water will soon cost an additional 50 cents per cubic m, starting with a 20-cent increase in April 2024 and a 30-cent rise in April 2025.

By then, most households will fork out an additional $4 to $9, excluding the goods and services tax (GST), for their monthly water bill. The last water price hike was in 2017.

Singapore’s carbon tax will also increase to $25 per tonne of carbon emissions from 2024, up from $5 per tonne now.

If power generation companies were to pass on the full cost of the carbon tax to consumers, residents of four-room Housing Board flats could fork out $4 more for their monthly utility bills.

In the first quarter of 2024, households supplied by SP Group will see a 5 per cent increase in electricity tariffs to 32.58 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) after GST, up from 31 cents now.

Town gas tariffs will also increase by about 4 per cent to 25.23 cents per kWh, up from 24.21 cents per kWh currently.

But consumers who have standard fixed price plans with electricity retailers will not see any change in their electricity tariffs until they renew their contracts.

Why it matters

The upcoming increase comes amid rising living costs, a GST hike and higher transport fares.

A day after news of the water price hike, the Government announced a $1.1 billion Cost-of-Living Support Package, which includes cash payouts and utilities rebates for Singaporeans and Singaporean households.

From January 2024 to December 2025, about 950,000 HDB households will receive an additional $20 per quarter in U-Save rebates, amounting to $80 a year.

Since 2017, the cost of treating and supplying water in Singapore has risen by about 30 per cent, mainly due to rising prices of energy, construction, chemicals and maintenance.

Climate advocates have long said that a carbon price of $5 per tonne was too low. The Government said the tax was set at a low price from 2019 to give emitters time to adjust.

4. Long Island to guard against sea-level rise

Three tracts of land could be reclaimed off East Coast Park in the coming decades, creating about 800ha of land and a new reservoir.

Called Long Island, these land tracts are about twice the size of Marina Bay. This plan is in response to the threat of rising sea levels and inland flooding in the East Coast area.

Apart from Long Island, the Government also contemplated building a sea wall up to 3m tall that would stretch from Marina East to Tanah Merah.

This option turned out to be not ideal, as parkgoers would have limited access to the waterfront when the sea wall is completed. Some existing greenery and recreational facilities could also be lost.

Why it matters

Land in the East Coast area is largely less than 5m above the mean sea level, the extent that sea levels are projected to rise to by the end of this century if extreme high tides coincide with storm surges.

Around Singapore, mean sea levels alone are projected to rise by up to 1m by the end of this century.

A new reservoir would also help to increase the country’s water supply.

However, experts say measures should be taken from the start to protect sensitive marine habitats in East Coast and the Southern Islands – less than 10km from the mainland – against the impacts of Long Island’s construction.

Sea life at East Coast Park – which includes corals, seagrass and hawksbill turtles – made a comeback decades after a previous reclamation. But biodiversity experts fear that the building of Long Island will wipe them out again.

5. COP28

The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Dubai (COP28) ended on Dec 13 with a deal supported by nearly 200 countries to transition away from fossil fuels.

This was the first time in nearly 30 years of the annual conference that the final text made a direct reference to fossil fuels.

To help channel much-needed funding towards greening the region, Singapore has launched a new blended finance initiative, known as the Financing Asia’s Transition Partnership, and hopes to raise US$5 billion (S$6.6 billion) for it.

At COP28, Singapore signed an agreement with Papua New Guinea to collaborate on carbon markets, which would allow Singapore firms to buy carbon credits from projects there to offset a small part of their carbon tax. The Republic also concluded negotiations with Paraguay, Bhutan, Vietnam and Ghana.

Why it matters

The summit’s final deal remained unsatisfactory for many countries that pushed for a phase-out of fossil fuels.

But the deal to transition away from the pollutive fuels means that small island states like Singapore could save a little on climate adaptation costs.

Singapore will not be claiming from a World Bank-hosted fund that compensates countries for the loss and damage from the impacts of climate change.

Instead, the Republic’s roles in climate financing are to help fellow small island states tap the fund, and also channel finance to projects that would otherwise not be profitable, through the blended finance initiative.

While countries did not reach an agreement related to carbon markets at the summit, Singapore continues to push for bilateral agreements in carbon trading.