Being a tropical archipelago that sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, Indonesia is blessed with an abundance of sources of renewable energy — geothermal, wind, solar and even tidal — but less than 5 percent of the power generated here actually comes from them.
In fact, the country’s potential for renewable energy is at least 27.6 gigawatts — considered the biggest reserve in the world — according to Indonesia’s 2010 Energy Outlook created by the Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT).
Still, the country’s five existing geothermal plants — out of 45 identified potential sites — only contribute 1.5 percent to power generation, while hydropower makes up 3.3 percent.
The vast majority of the 30,000 megawatts of power generated here every day comes from the usual sources: oil (47 percent), coal (26.4 percent) and natural gas (22 percent).
Questions are again being raised as to why Indonesia does not take advantage of its renewable energy sources, especially in the wake of skyrocketing oil prices as a result of the Middle East conflict, the nuclear crisis in Japan and the constant pressure from environmentalists to go clean and green as climate change becomes more apparent.
The questions are even more urgent given the fact that more than a third of Indonesia’s population is still without electricity, and energy consumption in the country increases at a rate of about 7 to 9 percent per year.
Luluk Sumiarso, the director general of renewable energy at the Energy Ministry, says Indonesia actually has a plan: 25 percent renewable power by 2025.
“Vision 25/25,” a plan laid out last year, envisions a power mix of 25 percent renewable energy, 23 percent natural gas, 30 percent oil, and 22 percent coal in 14 years time.
“Geothermal, hydropower and bio-energy are the flagship sources in this new policy,” Luluk said.
But the devil is in the details.
Unggul Priyanto, deputy head of technology, information, energy and materials at the BPPT, said that although geothermal held much potential, getting to the energy was often difficult.
“The locations are mostly in the mountains where distribution would be difficult,” he said. “In addition, geothermal is normally for middle scale capacity, 3-75 megawatts.”
Luluk said some of the sites were even in protected areas, making securing permits to build power plants a challenge.
Hydropower, according to Unggul, posed similar difficulties. In places like East Kalimantan or Papua, he said, there was plenty of hydropower potential, but the locations were too far away from consumers and the potential capacity was insufficient to meet demand.
Solar power, on the other hand, he added, was often only suitable for households, and thus was the renewable energy source of choice for remote areas not connected to the power grid. However, households in these often poor areas usually cannot afford solar energy, which is about three to four times pricier than coal and oil.
The point, Unggul said, was that Vision 25/25 would only become a reality if the government rolled out the necessary supporting policies.
“For instance, the government should lift oil subsidies and give sufficient subsidies for renewable energies so they can be competitive in price compared to other fossil energies,” he said.
Luluk explained that geothermal was actually cheaper to generate than the current electricity tariff. “The average national tariff is 0.07 rupiah per kWh but the actual price is 0.129 rupiah per kWh, so there’s a 0.059 rupiah subsidy,” he said.
“Meanwhile, geothermal costs 0.09 rupiah per kWh, lower than the actual price. So, it will reduce the government’s subsidy.”
Realistically though, Luluk said Indonesia couldn’t do away with fossil fuels just yet.
“Maybe in the future, we will no longer use any coal, or use cleaner coal. What we’re talking about here is to reduce it, not completely eliminate carbon fuels,” he said. “Energy efficient also means reducing fossil fuel use or avoiding using more fossil fuels.”
But given the rising prices of oil and the consequent increase in coal prices — the only thing actually cheaper than geothermal — Unggul was optimistic about the prospects.
“It also needs to be considered that geothermal is a much cleaner energy [compared to coal] because it does not emit pollutants or CO2 emissions. There would be so much more benefits from geothermal energy.”
