One million homes to get solar power generators
JAKARTA (JP): President Soeharto launched a project yesterday to provide solar power to one million homes in remote areas in the next five years.
"Electricity is an absolute need of an advanced society," Soeharto said. "The system is very simple, easy to operate and maintain. It does not require fuel, does not pollute the air and is not noisy.
"Therefore in regions where electricity is not expected to be installed in at least the next five years, we will overcome this with the Solar Energy Electricity Program," he said at Merdeka Palace.
He said that 44,000 of the country's 62,000 villages enjoyed electricity. "That shows our achievements in electricity development."
Soeharto was accompanied by State Minister of Research and Technology B.J. Habibie, Minister of Mines and Energy I.B. Sudjana and Minister of Cooperatives Subiakto Tjakrawerdjaja.
The launch was followed by a seminar on solar energy featuring Feisal Tamin of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Endro Utomo Notodisuryo of the Ministry of Mines and Energy and Mamiet Marjono of the Ministry of Cooperatives.
Other speakers included Arung Sangvi of the World Bank and Ashwin Sasongko Sastrosubroto of the National Institute of Energy.
Habibie said in his speech that the project's first stage would provide 36,400 solar power generators for homes in 150 villages in nine provinces of Southeast, Central and North Sulawesi, East and West Nusa Tenggara, East Timor, Maluku, Central Kalimantan and Irian Jaya.
The World Bank's acting representative, Ben Fisher, told The Jakarta Post yesterday that the bank was planning to finance part of the project to provide solar energy to 200,000 households in Lampung, Sumatra, West Java and South Sulawesi.
He said solar power would be provided to another 800,000 households thanks to government agencies, including the state electricity company PT PLN, the Agency for Assessment and Application of Technology and the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Fisher said the project would cost US$118.1 million, with $20 million provided by the World Bank, $24.3 million by the Global Environmental Facility, $1.5 million by the Indonesian government and the Agency for Assessment and Application of Technology, $5 million by participating banks and $67.3 million by households as potential consumers.
"The program provides consumers with energy for three to five lights, a television, a cassette radio," the World Bank's principal energy specialist Arung Sangvi said.
Additional funding in technical assistance worth $6.3 million would be provided by banks and the government, he said.
Habibie said the project aimed to provide a "stand alone" energy system for villages. One million homes will receive 50 megawatts of electricity.
Habibie, also head of the technology assessment agency, said that unlike diesel and coal burning, the stand alone system was environment-friendly and used a renewable resource.
He said consumers in remote areas could have solar energy for Rp 7,000 ($2.85) a month plus Rp 1,000 for services and Rp 2,000 for batteries that had to be replaced every three years.
During the one-day seminar, Habibie opened an exhibit for Australian, French and German companies which provide solar energy equipment through the agency. (01/06)