Viriya P. Singgih, Jakarta – The government revealed that the progress of its flagship 35,000-megawatt (MW) electricity procurement program had only reached 3.8 percent as of Feb. 1 since its launch in May 2015.
President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's administration initially planned to develop power plants with a combined capacity of 35,847 MW by 2019, more than 75 percent of which would be constructed by independent power producers (IPPs), while the rest would be the responsibility of state electricity firm PLN.
However, as of Feb. 1, only 1,362 MW worth of plants had commenced operations, 17,116 MW had begun construction, while 12,693 MW had been contracted and the remainder had only reached the procurement and planning stages.
Nevertheless, the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry's spokesperson, Agung Pribadi, said the figures signified forward movement in the country's electricity sector, especially considering that only 1,061 MW worth of plants had commenced operations in November last year.
"Such an increase was able to happen because of the support from the PLN and IPPs," Agung said over the weekend. The PLN previously stated that only 22,000 MW worth of plants under the flagship program would be operational in 2019.
This is triggered by, among other things, PLN's sluggish electricity sales growth of only around 4 percent throughout last year, far below the initial estimate of 8.3 percent. Subsequently, the utility firm has been forced to postpone the commercial operation date of a considerable amount of power plant projects in the 35,000 MW program. (evi)