Prabowo's 100 GW Solar Ambition Requires Land Nearly Twice the Size of South Jakarta

The administration of Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto has a plan to develop Solar Power Plants (PLTS) with a capacity reaching 100 Giga Watts (GW). The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) notes that 24,000 hectares of land are needed to support the realisation of this mega project. To put this into perspective, the land requirement is nearly twice the area of South Jakarta, which spans approximately 14,127 hectares. Therefore, the land needed for the 100 GW solar project is about 1.7 times the size of South Jakarta. Deputy Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Yuliot Tanjung stated that land availability is a crucial factor in accelerating the realisation of the 100 GW PLTS programme. His ministry has coordinated with the Ministry of Agrarian Affairs and Spatial Planning/National Land Agency (ATR/BPN) to identify suitable locations. ‘So, based on the identification we carried out jointly between the ESDM Ministry and the ATR/BPN Ministry, there are already around 24,000 hectares available on Java Island,’ Yuliot said at the ESDM Ministry. He noted that this land will be further verified together with ATR/BPN and the state electricity company PT PLN (Persero) to ensure the readiness of supporting infrastructure, including transmission networks and substations that will connect the power plants to the national electricity system. According to Yuliot, the government is also preparing a regulatory foundation to accelerate the implementation of the 100 GW PLTS project. The ministry is currently finalising a draft Presidential Regulation (Perpres) specifically governing the acceleration of solar power plant construction. ‘The ESDM Ministry is completing the draft presidential regulation for the acceleration of the 100 GW PLTS development. That is what we are doing. For the drafting of the presidential regulation, in addition to the parallel initiative permit, we are also conducting inter-ministerial discussions so that the regulatory basis for accelerating 100 GW of electricity from this PLTS can be realised,’ Yuliot said. President Prabowo Subianto is accelerating the transition to green energy, targeting a massive installed solar power capacity. He aims for Indonesia to achieve up to 100 GW of installed capacity by at least 2029. Prabowo stressed that the government will maximise the use of electricity from solar energy within the next three years. ‘We want to move very quickly to use electricity from solar energy. We have a plan and we are determined to proceed as fast as possible; within three years, we aim to achieve 100 gigawatts of solar energy,’ Prabowo said at the Indonesia-Japan Business Forum in Tokyo. The plan to accelerate solar plant development is considered urgent. According to him, escalating conflict and growing geopolitical uncertainty, particularly in the Middle East region, pose a threat to the stability of the national energy supply. ‘For us, this is more urgent because the geopolitical situation in the Middle East presents strategic uncertainty for our energy security,’ Prabowo stressed. As anticipation, the government continues to secure supply through the utilisation of domestic resources. Besides solar power, Indonesia also has significant potential in the geothermal sector and is boosting the production of biofuels such as 50% biodiesel (B50) and bioethanol.