Govt considers to change the bidding scheme for power projects

The government is considering to change the bidding regulation of power projects so that the state owned electricity company PLN would be able to directly appoint the investors of coal-fired power plants to be built within the next few years.

Director General of Electricity and Energy at the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources Yogo Pratomo said in Jakarta on Monday that the change in the bidding regulation was needed in order to support the crash program to be implemented by the government in the construction of the new power projects within the next two and half years.

"The appointment of the developer is carried out through a tender process will take at least one year. We want to shorten the process such as through direct appointment so that no much time will be wasted for selecting the developer or investor," he said.

The government is studying the possibility of implementing a crash program for the development of coal-fired power plants with total capacity of 8,000 MW within the next two and half years to cope with the shortage of power supply.

Yogo said that the crash program would be also applied on the conversion of the existing diesel oil power projects into coal-fired power plants in order to lessen PLN's dependence on the use of oil.

"At present about 41 percent from 25,000 MW or about 10,000 MW of power supply are provided by diesel power plants. In the future the number of diesel power plants should be reduced in order to cut operating costs," he added. (Godang)