Govt urged to accelerate development of non-oil energy sources

State oil and gas firm Pertamina has urged the government to accelerate the development of non-oil energy sources as the country is facing a decline in oil reserves.

?Indonesia will have to make itself ready to import oil. For this, it has to diversify its sources of energy,? Pertamina president director Baihaki Hakim told reporters on Tuesday.

Government officials said the country would become a net oil importer in about 10 years? time if it could not cut its domestic consumption of oil.

Baihaki said Indonesia?s oil reserves were depleting.

He admitted however that the country had made progress in geothermal energy development including the development of geothermal power projects.

Indonesia currently has a number of geothermal power plants with combined capacity of some 750 megawatts. The country is said to have large geothermal resources in different provinces, and that they account for some 40 percent of the world?s total.

Meanwhile, the country also has large reserves of natural gas, but it has to spend big amounts of funds to build gas transmitting pipelines including undersea pipelines. (godang)