Factories worried over possible blackouts
Fitri Wulandari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The dry season became potentially more painful for footwear businessman Djimanto when he heard warnings of possible power shortages in Java and Bali as a result of the drought there.
"That is terrible. It (a power shortage) could cut our production by half," Djimanto told The Jakarta Post over the weekend.
"Electricity is vital for our office and factory. How can we work without an adequate power supply?" he said.
Edi Sulistya, an official at textile company PT Grandtex Textile Company, expressed similar concerns.
"We have never had any power disruptions before. If we do now, it will quite be bad for production," Edi told the Post.
Both have strong reason to worry, as state power firm PT PLN has painted a gloomy picture of power supplies in Java and Bali, the country's most densely populated islands, in the coming days.
PLN warned that if the drought continues through next month, a power shortage was imminent on both islands as a number of hydropower plants would have to stop operating due to a lack of water.
Hydropower plants contribute some 2,536 megawatts (MW) to the Java-Bali network, or 14 percent of the total supply for the region.
At present, PLN can only supply slightly above the peak load of about 13,250 MW, from a total installed capacity of 18,000 MW. This leaves the Jawa-Bali power system vulnerable to power disruptions.
PLN warned the potential power supply shortfall could become more serious when a number of coal and oil-fired power plants underwent routine overhauls scheduled for October.
Although industry only makes up 0.2 percent of the total 30 million electricity subscribers, it accounts for up to 42.1 percent of PLN's energy sales of 84,520 gigawatts per hours (GwH).
PLN has advised industrial customers to cut their power consumption and not to operate during the peak hours between 6 p.m. and 10 p.m.
The firm also urged its industrial customers to use their own power generators, which is better known in the industry as "captive power", to cover any power shortfalls.
"To tell you the truth, we don't know what we are going to do if there are rotating blackouts.
"We only have a diesel-fueled power generator, which has too small a capacity to supply power to our production units around the clock," Edi said.
Grandtex, which produces denim for export, operates one factory on the outskirts of Bandung, West Java.
Djimanto said: "We cannot rely on generators because they are only for emergency use and not for supporting production for the whole day."
Djimanto said the power supply for footwear factories was particularly crucial in October, when orders usually peaked.
"Orders for footwear, particularly for the domestic market, will reach their peak in October ahead of the big holidays at the end of the year," Djimanto, who is also a board member of the Indonesian Footwear Association, said.
If production is severely interrupted due to rotating blackouts, footwear companies will be forced to import shoes to fill orders, he said.