Multinationals bid for Sumatra-Java transmission project

By Bernard Loebs

Five multinational corporations? Siemens of Germany, Hitachi of Japan, Toshiba of Japan, ABB of Swiss, Marubeni of Japan, Alstom of France? are taking part in the tender for the construction of power transmission lines from South Sumatra to West Java.

ABB is bidding for the project in a consortium with Marubeni, while Alston teams up with Indonesian firm PT Wijaya Karya, Nasri Sebayang, Construction Director of state owned electricity firm PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN), said on Friday.

The project involves the installation of power transmission lines from Bangko Tengah area in South Sumatra to Bogor, West Java. Thanks to the transmission lines, coal-rich South Sumatra, where a number of coal-fired power plants are now under construction or have been planned for construction, can send its power production to Java. A section of the power plant will be installed underwater in Sunda Strait.

Cables used for the 700-km power are of DC type rather than AC type since on the grounds that power losses reach 20 percent using AC cables, while the losses reach only 5 percent using DC cables, he said.

Editing by Johannes Simbolon