West Sumatra councillors discuss power crisis with PLN officials
West Sumatra councillors discuss power crisis with PLN officials
Syofiardi Bachyul Jb, Padang
West Sumatra Legislative Council held a meeting on Friday with
officials of state electricity company PLN's West Sumatra office
to discuss the prolonged electricity crisis in West Sumatra and
its two neighboring provinces, Riau and Jambi.
PLN's West Sumatra office oversees the power supply in the
three provinces.
Power has been shut down by rotation in the three provinces
for a month, after the water debit in several reservoirs in the
provinces -- used by power plants here to generate electricity --
dropped due to the dry season.
The power cuts can last for between three and six hours a day
in each province, and sometimes between six and 10 hours a day.
In the meeting, several councillors with Commission D for
development questioned the state electricity company's
contingency plan to end the power crisis. The councillors also
lashed out at the company for its failure to swiftly end the
power crisis that has crippled businesses in the three provinces.
Responding to the questions by the councillors, head of PT
PLN's West Sumatra office Sofyan Amin explained that currently
peak capacity of the power plants in the three provinces is 520
megawatts.
He confirmed that the crisis started after the water debit in
reservoirs and lakes that provided power for Singkarak, Maninjau
and Kotopanjang power plants began to drop.
The power shortage was also aggravated by a damaged generator
in the steam-powered Ombilin power plant. Sofyan admitted that
PLN was indeed late in anticipating the dry season, which led to
the power crisis.
"We had predicted that the dry season would start between
August and early October, but it started in June," said Sofyan.
He claimed that the power crisis in the three provinces had
come to an end last week, as the generator in Ombilin power
plant had been repaired, while PLN also received an additional
100 megawatts of power from PLN's South Sumatra office.
Sofyan also said that the company was trying cloud seeding
over several reservoirs and lakes in the three provinces in order
to produce rain to help raise the water debit.
In order to prevent another electricity crisis in the future,
the state electricity company plans to forge partnerships with
regental governments in South Pesisir regency and Payakumbuh
municipality to build power plants in those cities.
Meanwhile, in response to the electricity crisis, the
Indonesia Consumer Foundation's (YLKI) West Sumatra office is
planning to file a class action suit against the state
electricity company.
The deputy chairman of YLKI's West Sumatra office, Dahnil
Aswad, said that the plan was based on complaints from people of
all walks of life in the province, including from telephone
kiosks associations (wartel), garment factories and others who
had suffered huge losses due to the crisis.