ASEAN summits have become a masterclass in performative hand-wringing. Every year, regional leaders gather to lament the "energy crisis" as if it were a rogue asteroid plummeting toward Southeast Asia. They treat energy insecurity as an external curse, a byproduct of global geopolitics or the fickle nature of supply chains.
They are lying. Or worse, they are delusional. In similar developments, we also covered: Strategic Posturing in the Strait of Hormuz The Mechanics of Iranian Maritime Influence.
The narrative suggests that the region is a victim of high fuel prices and a lagging transition to green power. The reality is far more cynical. Southeast Asia doesn't have an energy crisis; it has an infrastructure fetish and a chronic addiction to protectionist subsidies that stifle the very innovation leaders claim to want. While the "competitor" headlines scream about the urgent need for a unified grid and emergency fuel reserves, they miss the structural rot beneath the floorboards.
The Grid is a Ghost
Policy circles love to talk about the ASEAN Power Grid (APG). It sounds sophisticated. It sounds unified. In practice, it’s a series of bilateral handshakes that barely move the needle. The Economist has provided coverage on this critical topic in extensive detail.
The dream of a multilateral electricity market across ten nations is treated as a "pivotal" (to use the tired jargon of the bureaucrats) solution to price volatility. It isn't. You cannot build a regional superpower on a foundation of nationalistic protectionism.
For decades, state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Thailand, Vietnam, and Indonesia have guarded their monopolies like dragons sitting on a pile of coal. They don't want a regional grid. A regional grid means competition. It means transparency. It means the end of "sweetheart deals" for domestic coal producers.
When leaders talk about the energy crisis at the summit, they are actually talking about their inability to keep prices artificially low without bankrupting their treasuries. They aren't worried about the lights going out; they are worried about the subsidies running out.
The Natural Gas Trap
The common consensus is that Natural Gas is the "bridge fuel" for ASEAN. This is a fairy tale told by the LNG industry to ensure they have a market for the next thirty years.
Relying on LNG to solve an energy crisis is like trying to pay off a credit card with a payday loan. The price of LNG is tethered to global spot markets that Southeast Asian economies cannot control and cannot afford when the volatility hits. We saw this in 2022. While Europe outbid everyone for every available molecule of gas, emerging markets in Asia were left in the dark.
Instead of pivoting, what did ASEAN do? They doubled down on regasification terminals.
Investing billions in gas infrastructure right now isn't "securing the future." It is a massive misallocation of capital. By the time these terminals are fully operational, the "bridge" will lead to a stranded asset graveyard. The real contrarian play isn't finding more gas; it's admitting that the gas bridge is a pier that ends in the middle of the ocean.
Renewables are Being Sabotaged by Design
You will hear plenty of talk about the "energy transition" during the summit. Leaders will brag about solar capacity targets and wind farm MoUs.
Don't buy it.
In many ASEAN markets, the regulatory framework is intentionally designed to make renewables fail. Take "take-or-pay" contracts for coal plants. In countries like Indonesia and Vietnam, the government is often legally obligated to pay coal operators for power even if they don't need it.
When you have a massive oversupply of coal-fired electricity that you have to pay for anyway, why would you ever integrate solar or wind at scale? You wouldn't. It would be a fiscal disaster.
The "crisis" isn't that there isn't enough green energy. The crisis is that the region has built a legal and financial cage that prevents green energy from ever being the cheapest option. If these leaders were serious, they wouldn't be asking for "climate finance" from the West; they would be tearing up the coal contracts that are strangling their own markets.
The Myth of the "Unified Voice"
There is a persistent idea that if ASEAN speaks with one voice, it can dictate terms to global energy markets or demand better financing from the World Bank.
This ignores the fundamental divergence of interest within the bloc. Singapore is a high-tech city-state obsessed with decarbonization to maintain its status as a global hub. Vietnam is an industrial powerhouse that needs every megawatt it can get to keep the factories running, carbon be damned. Indonesia is a coal exporter that benefits when prices are high, even if its own citizens suffer.
Asking ASEAN to have a unified energy strategy is like asking a group of people to agree on a dinner menu when three are vegans and two are butchers. The "summitry" is a facade that hides the fact that these nations are in direct competition for the same capital and the same resources.
Stop Trying to "Fix" the Crisis (Change the Incentive)
The standard advice is always: more investment, more summits, more regional cooperation.
That advice is garbage. It hasn't worked for twenty years.
If you want to actually solve the energy problem in Southeast Asia, you have to embrace the chaos of the market rather than trying to manage it through a committee of aging politicians.
- Kill the Subsidies: If you want people to care about energy efficiency or renewables, you have to stop shielding them from the real cost of fossil fuels. Subsidies are a drug that keeps the population quiet but kills the economy's long-term health.
- Decentralize the Grid: Stop waiting for the "Great ASEAN Grid." It’s a pipe dream. The real revolution is happening in microgrids and industrial zones that are going off-grid because the state-owned utilities are too slow and too expensive.
- Force the SOEs to Compete: Break the monopolies of the national power companies. Allow private power purchase agreements (PPAs) without the state acting as a parasitic middleman.
The "experts" will tell you this is too risky. They will say it threatens "energy security." What they mean is that it threatens their control.
The true energy crisis in ASEAN is a crisis of imagination. Leaders are trying to solve 21st-century problems with 20th-century institutions and 19th-century fuels. Until they stop protecting the incumbents and start protecting the innovators, the summits will remain nothing more than expensive photo ops in air-conditioned rooms, powered by the very coal they claim to be moving away from.
Burn the coal contracts. End the subsidies. Stop talking.
