PLN struggles to solve power crisis
plans to cut power supplies to customers this evening
Thursday, June 21 2007 - 01:19 PM WIB
State owned electricity company PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) said on Thursday power supplies to all regions in Java would be cut as it was still struggling to resume the operation of several power generators that have been shut down due to various reasons, including shortage of fuel.
PLN’s president Eddie Widiono told reporters that power supply to the Java-Bali power grid would suffer from a deficit of 428 Megawatt (MW) this evening as a result of the shutdown of the power plants.
PLN will thus cut power supplies to all regions across Java.
He said PLN expected the Muara Tawar combined cycle power plant in
PLN shut down the 6x140 MW combined cycle power plant this week because the vessel that carried oil fuel to the power plant had a problem with its unloading facility. PLN has ordered another vessel to carry fuel for the power plant.
“The vessel is approaching the power plant,” Eddie said.
PLN also expected PT Paiton Energy Company (PEC), which operates a 2x660 MW power plant in Paition, Probolinggo,
Aside from the power plant, several other power plants are also either shut down or has production facilities that can’t operate due to various reasons. The 740 MW Cilegon combined cycle power plant in Banten has been shut down for more than a week after Chinese firm CNOOC, the gas supplier, temporarily halted the supply due to a tie-in work aimed to boost gas supply to the power plant in the future. CNOOC supplies the gas from its offshore fields north of
PLN could not also operate the 600 MW Unit 5 of its coal fired Suralaya power plant due to a damage in its transformer. PLN’s director of power generation and primary energy Ali Herman Ibrahim said on Thursday it would take one year to repair the damage.
Another power plant that is experiencing problem is the 2x300 MW Cilacap coal fired power plant. PLN could not operate the power plant because the falling of the sea’s surface had made the cooling facility of the power plant fail to function.
“Weather is something that we can’t predict. The surface of the sea has been on the rise that hopefully we can operate one unit of the power plant this evening,” Eddi said. (Godang)