Electricity tariff from biogas, biomass plants to be increased

The government plans to increase the feed in tariff of electricity from biogas and biomass power plants as part of incentives for developers particularly amid the current sharp drop in the value of the rupiah against the US dollar, Bisnis Indonesia reported on Friday.

The paper quoted Director General of New and Renewable Energy at the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Rida Mulyana as saying that the depreciation of the rupiah against the dollar has undermined the operators of biogas and biomass power plants.

He said that the current selling price of electricity produced from biogas and biomass power plants to state-owned electricity company PLN according to Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Regulation No 27/2014 is based on the rupiah exchange rate assumption of Rp 10,500-Rp 11,000 per US dollar. Since the past year, the rupiah has suffered sharp depreciation falling to a low of more than Rp 13,000 per dollar.

Rida said that the government was also considering to increase the feed in tariff of electricity from other alternative sources of energy including waste-generated power plants, and micro hydro power plants. (*)