Indonesia will use bio-fuel as alternative energy
Indonesia will use bio-fuel as alternative energy
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
As the fuel shortage has hit the country and global oil prices
have reached US$61 per barrel, the government plans to use crude
palm oil (CPO) and other bio-mass fuel as an alternative energy
source.
State Minister of Research and Technology Kusmayanto Kadiman
said to overcome the recent fuel shortage, Indonesia would need
cheap and renewable alternative energy in the future.
"We need to reduce fossil-fuel consumption and look for
alternative sources which are more environmentally friendly," he
told participants of an international conference on Indonesia's
automotive industry and the global environmental challenge on
Monday.
The minister said the government would issue regulations to
support the production and use of alternative fuel.
"Government intervention is needed to meet the target of
reducing the country's oil consumption to only 30 percent by
2025," he said.
Kusmayanto named several energy sources -- coal, water, solar,
nuclear power and green fuel or bio-mass -- as energy sources
that would supply the remaining 70 percent for domestic
consumption by 2025.
But he pointed to CPO, which will be refined as bio-diesel, as
the most feasible option due to its advantages.
"If 2 percent of diesel fuel consumption in 2010 can be
fulfilled by bio-diesel, it would require 800,000 tons of CPO,"
he said.
"The figure (of the CPO) can only be produced by having
230,000 hectares of oil palm plantation, which needs 100,000
plantation workers as well as 5,000 people in the biodiesel
plant," he said, explaining the snowball effect.
Indonesia is the second largest CPO producer in the world.
Together with Malaysia, it controls 85 percent of the global CPO
production. Last year, there was a total of 4.1 million hectares
of oil palm plantations in the country.
Kusmayanto encouraged the private sector, particularly
automotive manufacturers, to invest in developing bio-diesel to
advance its mass production.
Secretary-general of the Ministry of Trade Hatanto
Reksodipoetro said his ministry would formulate several
incentives for firms interested in investing in alternative
energy.
"So far, we haven't done anything. But the trade ministry
could provide support by reducing tax for imported capital goods
needed by the industries," he told The Jakarta Post on the
sidelines of the conference.
Separately, Coordinating Minister for the Economy Aburizal
Bakrie said the government would launch a diversification and
conservation campaign aimed at reducing the country's crude oil
consumption.
"The government won't any longer use energy (sources) that are
expensive and not widely available in Indonesia," he was quoted
by Dow Jones news wires as saying.
He said the government would offset the reduction by doubling
LNG and coal consumption from the current level of between 5
percent and 15 percent within 10 years. (006)