PLN projects electricity sales to grow 5.6% this year
Thursday, January 31 2019 - 12:59 AM WIB
By Nova Farida
State-owned electricity firm PT PLN projected electricity sales to grow by 5.6 percent this year to 245 TWh compared to sales last year.
PLN Director of Strategic Procurement Supangkat Iwan Santoso said on Wednesday that the sales growth will be primarily driven by power demand from the industrial sector particularly in Java and possibly in Sulawesi where new nickel smelters are being developed or coming on-stream.
He said that while demand from households will also increase, the bulk of the country?s power demand comes from the industrial sector.
Supangkat said that last year, electricity sales only grew by 3.1 percent to 232 TWh from 225 TWh in 2017. The relatively weaker growth rate was due to the country's slower economic growth, he said.
Under the proposed new 2019-2028 electricity procurement business plan (or RUPTL) of PLN, electricity sales is targeted to grow at an average annual rate of 6.43 percent, lower than the 6.9 percent rate under the previous RUPTL. Number of PLN new customers is targeted at 22,978, compared to 25,496 in the previous RUPTL.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak