Three power plants stop operation for a regular overhaul

Three power generators at three major power plants, Muara Karang combined-cycle power plant in North Jakarta, Suralaya coal-fired power plant in Merak, Banten and Tanjung Priok combined-cycle power plant in North Jakarta, have stopped operations due to a regular overhaul.

Djuanda Nugraha Ibrahim, acting president director of the state-owned electricity company PLN, admitted that the three power plants could not be fully operated for about a month due to a regular overhaul.

PLN's spokeperson Muljo Adji said that the Suralaya coal-fired power plant had stopped its sixth generator which has capacity of 600 MW, while Tanjung Priok combined-cycle power plant had stopped its GT-2.2 generator which has a capacity of 140 MW.

Previously, one unit of the Muara Tawar power plant had totally stopped its operation for the last two days due to the delay in the fuel supply. The stoppage of the Muara Tawar power plant which provided power supply of about 840 MW to the Java-Bali power grid had caused a serious power shortage forcing PLN to enforce rotating blackouts in Jakarta and surrounding areas.

Muljo said PLN hoped the Muara Tawar power plant could resume operation today. But industrial users were still concerned about the possible rotating blackouts in the next few weeks if PLN could not provide additional power supply to compensate the decline in the supply due to the stoppage of the three power generators at the three major power plants. (godang)