Consortium to build $200m power plant

Consortium to build $200m power plant

JAKARTA (JP): A consortium of the state electricity company PT PLN, the state mining company PT Aneka Tambang, a private firm PT Iroda, and a foreign company will build a 96-megawatt (MW) hydro- power plant in Pomalaa, Southeast Sulawesi.

"The US$200 million power project is expected to come on stream in 1998," Aneka Tambang's president Darmoko Slamet was quoted by Antara as saying in Pomalaa.

He refused to mention the name of the foreign company.

The hydro power plant will harness the Oko-oko, Komoro and Huko-huko rivers near Aneka Tambang's nickel mining concession areas in Pomalaa to generate the electricity, he said.

The electricity needs of Aneka Tambang's Pomalaa ferronickel processing plant are currently supplied by a nearby 29-MW diesel power plant, Darmoko said.

He said the hydro-power project would be built to support Aneka Tambang's expansion plans to increase its current annual production capacity from 11,000 tons of ferronickel to 22,000 tons in 1999.

Aneka Tambang exported 70 percent of the 10,341 tons of ferronickel it produced last year to Japan and the remaining 30 percent to South Korea, the United States and European countries.

Darmoko said his company also plans to build a stainless steel plant using its ferronickel as a raw material but he declined to give further details.

Besides nickel, Aneka Tambang also produces gold, silver, iron sand and bauxite. (04)