Update 1: PLN may take one year to repair Suralaya power generator

(The article first appeared under the headline “Suralaya Unit 5 goes down on transformer damage”. The content is rewritten with more details on the Suralaya power plant)

 

State electricity firm PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) said it may take one year to repair a power generator at its giant coal fired power plant in Suralaya, West Java .

 

Ali Herman Ibrahim, PLN’s director of primary energy and power generation, said on Thursday that PLN was looking for spare parts to fix the problem at the transformer of Suralaya’s Unit 5 that has a power generation capacity of 600 MW.

 

“It will take one year to repair (the transformer). We are looking for the spare parts,” he said.

 

The power unit is one of the power generators in Java that are currently unable to operate, causing power supplies to the Java-Bali power grid to drop to a critical level. PLN announced on Wednesday that partial blackouts could hit several parts of the islands due to the drop in the power supply.

 

Located near the coastal city of Merak in Banten, the Suralaya power plant complex is the largest in the country with seven generators with a total capacity of 3,400 MW. The Unit 1-4 has a capacity of 400 MW each, while the Unit 5-7 has a capacity of 600 MW. The power plant get most of its coal supplies from state owned coal miner PT Tambang Batubara Bukit Asam. (Godang)