Yeo Bee Yin

Yeo Bee Yin (born 26 May 1983) is a Malaysian politician and field engineer who has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Puchong since November 2022.

Yeo was born on 26 May 1983, and started growing up in Gomali Estate before moving to a small town, Batu Anam in Segamat at the northern part of Johor.

Yeo attended Sekolah Jenis Kebangsaan (C) Hwa Nan, Batu Anam.

She graduated from Universiti Teknologi Petronas (UTP) with First Class Honors in Chemical Engineering under the Petronas Scholarship in 2006.

After two years working with Schlumberger, she went on to pursue an MPhil (Masters in Philosophy) in Advanced Chemical Engineering at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, under the Gates Cambridge Scholarship by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and completed her degree with a Commendation.

Yeo had been volunteering for DAP since February 2012 before joining the party permanently with another academician, Dr Ong Kian Ming, in August the same year.

While running her own business, she was also the social media strategic advisor to the party, as well as special assistant to Tony Pua, the MP of Petaling Jaya Utara.

She is also the National Assistant Publicity Secretary of the DAP, Vice Chairperson of Pakatan Harapan Youth, and Political Education Director of DAP Wanita Selangor.

In the 2013 general election (GE13), Yeo contested for the first time and won the Selangor State Legislative Assembly constituency for Damansara Utama on a DAP ticket with 83.6% of the votes and a 30,689 majority, the highest majority for state seats in Malaysia.

She was the youngest member of the Selangor State Legislative Assembly then.

Following her election, Yeo said that her main priorities were decreasing the high crime rates, traffic jams, as well as combating flash floods and poverty.

According to a scientific study published in the journal Science in 2015, Malaysia is ranked 8th in mismanaged plastic wastes.

Mismanagement of plastic waste will impact the environment, health and economy of the country.

There are also plastics that will decompose into micro-plastic that can enter the food chain and affect aquatic life and human health.

Therefore, Malaysia Roadmap Towards Zero Single-Use Plastic by 2030 launched in October 2018 is a guideline for the nation to implement actions in phases for the next 12 years leading to 2030.

The roadmap is a living document which allows the state governments to roll out the initiatives and implementation of policies according to each state level of awareness and readiness within the time frame set by MESTECC.

The Malaysian Government has decided to cancel four Independent Power Producer (IPP)s' contracts, awarded through direct negotiations, for failing to adhere to conditions stipulated in the respective offer letters.

She also served as the Assistant National Publicity Secretary of DAP from November 2017 to March 2022.

In March 2017, Yeo questioned the finances of the PERMATApintar (commonly known just as PERMATA) programme, a child education and welfare programme, of which Prime Minister Najib Razak's wife, Rosmah Mansor is the patron, urging for the transparency of the organisation's financial accounts.

Yeo also questioned the need for a separate agency under the Prime Minister's Department with Rosmah, an individual not elected by the people, to have such a significant role in government, saying that early childhood development programmes such as PERMATA should be under the respective full ministries which are more equipped and have the personnel with more experience in the field.

She served as the Minister of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change in the Pakatan Harapan (PH) administration under former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad from July 2018 to the collapse of the PH administration in February 2020, MP for Bakri from May 2018 to November 2022 and Member of the Selangor State Legislative Assembly (MLA) for Damansara Utama from May 2013 to May 2018.

She is a member of the Democratic Action Party (DAP), a component party of the PH coalition.

She has also served as the Deputy Women Chief of DAP since September 2023.

Yeo was picked by DAP to contest in the 2018 general election (GE14) as the Pakatan Harapan candidate for the Bakri parliamentary seat in Johor and elected to the Parliament.

Yeo was appointed and sworn in as Minister of Energy, Technology, Science, Climate Change and Environment on 2 July 2018, as part of Prime Minister Mahathir's 7th Cabinet.

The ministry was later renamed as Ministry of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change (MESTECC) on 2 August 2018 for acronym convenience purposes.

Amongst her early actions as minister was to announce an increase of renewable energy goals from 2% to 20% by 2030.

She has also initiated a refurbishment of government buildings to lead on efficient energy consumption.

She has helped to set up a nationwide ban on the import of plastic waste and published a 12-year roadmap that includes a legal framework in eliminating the use of single use plastics in Malaysia by 2030.

Within a few short months as minister, her work on the environment had already garnered recognition from the journal Nature.

This announcement was made in a reply by Minister of Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change Yeo Bee Yin to a question from Ipoh Timur MP Wong Kah Woh in Parliament on 25 October 2018.

The four cancelled IPPs were Malakoff Corp Bhd and Tenaga Nasional Bhd's 700MW gas powered plant in Kapar, Selangor; Aman Majestic Sdn Bhd and Tenaga Nasional's 1,400MW plant in Paka, Terengganu; Sabah Development Energy (Sandakan) Sdn Bhd and SM Hydro Energy Sdn Bhd hydropower plant at the Palm Oil Industrial Cluster (POIC) in Sandakan, Sabah and The solar power quota of 400MW to Edra Power Holdings Sdn Bhd for the utilisation of solar power plant.

If the national electric installed reserve margin remained at the optimal 32% and if these projects were allowed to continue, it would increase the reserve margin to 46%, which is a level above what is required.

When capacity payments increase, so will the electric bills.

The cancellations had allowed the Government to achieve a savings of RM1.26 billion in electric supply.

A total of 156MW (155.7256MW) renewable energy quota revoked in September 2018 allowing for 115MW (114.5682MW) on offer in the fourth quarter of 2018.

The quota will be opened for application in batches.

The mini hydro will have a quota of 74.5682 MW for application expected to achieve commercial operations by 2020 and 2021.

The quota allocated for biogas and biomass are 30MW and 10MW respectively; these quota are for applications achieving commercial operations by 2021.

That is the first time Sustainable Energy Development Authority (SEDA) had opens the e-bidding for biogas in Feed in Tariff system aiming to create better pricing efficiency for electricity generated from the biogas resources through healthy competition.