Unocal starts power plant

Unocal starts power plant

SINGAPORE (AFP): U.S. energy firm Unocal Corp. said here yesterday that the second of two 55-megawatt power plants started commercial operations at the company's maiden geothermal energy development project in Indonesia.

The company's wholly-owned subsidiary Unocal Geothermal of Indonesian Ltd., under a joint operation contract from state oil company Pertamina, supplies energy to fuel power plants at the Gunung Salak geothermal field in West Java, south of Jakarta.

The first 55-megawatt power plant began commercial operations in July this year, according to a statement issued by Unocal's representative office in Singapore.

The statement said Unocal was working with Pertamina and PLN, Indonesia's state utility, to expand power generating capacity of the field by an additional 220 megawatts.

Unocal, based in Los Angeles, was also conducting an exploration in the highly prospective Sarulla block in northern Sumatra under a separate joint operation contract from Pertamina, the statement said.