Danantara to Review PLN Following Sumatra Blackout

Danantara’s Chief Operating Officer Dony Oskaria confirmed that a review of PT PLN ( Persero) will follow the Sumatra blackout. The incident on Friday, 22 May 2026, affected Aceh, North Sumatra, West Sumatra, Riau, and Jambi provinces. ‘We will review the process, including the cause, and future anticipation, most importantly, mitigation measures to prevent this from happening again,’ he said at Danantara House on Monday, 25 May 2026. The power outage also disrupted various public facilities, with restoration occurring gradually across Sumatra’s regions. PLN Transmission Director Edwin Nugraha Putra stated that the phased restoration was due to transmission system conditions and differing generator types in affected regions. Two hours after the outage, PLN checked the transmission system via Extra High Voltage Substation (GITET). ‘Once the transmission system stabilised, we switched to power generation,’ he said at a press conference at the NationalPolice headquarters yesterday. Initially, diesel (PLTD) and gas (PLTG) power plants were the fastest to restart, with affected regions using these plants regaining power within 3-5 hours after transmission stabilised. PLN then activated combined-cycle gas and steam plants (PLTGU), which required 10-15 hours post-transmission normalisation. PLN apologised for the inconvenience caused, with restoration efforts ongoing.