House to soon draft geothermal power bill

A'an Suryana, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The House of Representatives endorsed a plan, during a plenary session on Monday, to draft a law on geothermal power to help provide legal certainty for investors in the field.

The initiative to draft the law came from House Commission VIII on energy and mineral resources. The House rarely uses its right to initiate the drafting of a law.

All nine factions approved the plan.

The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the biggest faction in the House, supported the bill to help guide the government in formulating its geothermal policy.

"So far, we only have a presidential decree. The law is needed to serve as an umbrella law on geothermal power," Paulus Maria Saul De Ornay read out, in his faction statement before the plenary meeting.

Meanwhile, the Golkar Party faction endorsed the initiative on the grounds that the Law on Geothermal Power could ensure legal certainty in the field.

"Legal certainty is important as geothermal power is considered a high-risk investment for investors," said Djamaluddin Sahidu, representing his faction, the second biggest in the House.

Djamaluddin added that presidential decrees often change so it would not necessarily ensure legal certainty.

Some 349 out of a total of 500 DPR members were present at the plenary session.

During Monday's plenary meeting, the factions underlined the importance of geothermal power in Indonesia.

Geothermal power is environmentally friendly and could boost the supply of electricity power amid the threat of power shortages, legislators said.

They also said that geothermal power had enormous potential in Indonesia.

According to a government data, 40 percent of the world's geothermal resources are located in Indonesia, which could potentially produce some 20,000 megawatts of electricity.