Chinese firm to process city's waste, sell to PLN
Novan Iman Santosa, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
In an attempt to handle its garbage, the city administration signed on Wednesday a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with a Chinese firm and state electricity company PLN to use garbage to produce electricity.
Under the US$37 million MOU, the Chinese firm, the Hangzhou Jijian Group, will construct and operate a power plant that will use coal mixed with garbage and sell its power to PLN.
The city administration will supply 1,000 tons of garbage per day to the power plant to generate 30 megawatts of electricity.
Governor Sutiyoso signed the MOU with PLN's director of marketing and distribution, Tunggono, and president of the Chinese company, Dou Zhenggang, at City Hall.
To date, the city has signed four other MOUs on managing the city's garbage, but none of them have been realized so far. MOUs have been signed with PT Bio Fertilizer Indonesia, which uses Canadian technology, and PT Interindo Global, which uses American technology, to produce ethyl-alcohol and raw plastic.
The third MOU was on sending packaged garbage to Bangka- Belitung province and the fourth was on using a landfill in Jonggol, West Java.
The head of the Jakarta Development Planning Board, Ritola Tasmaya, denied that the MOUs had proved to be ineffective as all of them were in the feasibility study phase.
"We cannot apply an MOU just like that as we need to do assessments such as an environmental impact analysis and other research."
"If all MOUs were feasible, there would be no problem with the closure of Bantar Gebang dump next year as each MOU would have the capacity to take about 1,000 tons of garbage a day."
He said that the fifth MOU could be realized soon because the Chinese firm, owned by the Hangzhou provincial administration, had constructed and operated similar plants in China.
"PLN has sent a team to China to inspect existing power plants so I think we must take this opportunity, especially since the Chinese company is willing to invest here," he told The Jakarta Post.
"No risk at all is being borne by the city administration as we will only supply a fixed amount of garbage to the power plant."
Jakarta produces 6,400 tons of waste each day and its contract to use the Bantar Gebang dump in Bekasi will expire in 2003.
Although there is no financial risk in the project, the city administration will have to pay a dumping fee of $3 per ton of garbage, which totals about $90,000 a month or more than $1 million a year.
Despite the huge dumping fee, Ritola claimed it was much cheaper than present waste management costs.
The city administration paid Rp 8.5 billion ($965,000) in compensation to the Bekasi administration this year. Last year, it paid Rp 2.5 billion.
Jakarta also agreed to build facilities in the Bantar Gebang area such a hospital and water treatment plant that could amount to tens of billion rupiah.
In a separate development, City Sanitation Agency head Selamet Limbong said a three-month trial period of an experimental incinerator in Danau Sunter, North Jakarta, would begin soon.
"We want to start it by the end of this month or in the first week of September at the latest," he said.
"The incinerator will be operated by PT Mitra Setia Sejati, which uses Korean technology with an initial capacity of 60 tons of garbage per day.
"We will increase the capacity to about 900 tons a day if the pilot project goes smoothly," he added.
In contrast to the Chinese technology, the Korean technology needs a trial run prior to full-scale operation.
"The smaller capacity is necessary to evaluate Jakarta's garbage type which may differ from Korea's type of garbage.
"We may have to make necessary adjustments to the incinerator if there is any difference in waste type," said Limbong.