Wartsila, PLN sign agreement to develop power generation in RI

By Romel S. Gurky

Finnish manufacturer of power and energy equipment Wartsila and Indonesia?s state-owned electricity firm PT PLN signed on Friday a MoU to cooperate on the development of 500 megawatts (MW) of power generation solutions and related small scale LNG storage and regasification infrastructure in Indonesia.

Wartsila said in a statement the MoU was signed in conjunction with Indonesian State Owned Enterprises Minister Rini Soemarno?s visit to Finland.

?This power generation is forecasted to be contracted and installed as several projects during the next two years. Another major aspect in this agreement is the emphasis put on further developing local Indonesian capability in power projects execution, knowledge transfer and development of local skills,? the statement said.

Thanks to a rapidly developing economy, the standard of living in Indonesia has significantly improved in recent years. Supporting further economic growth requires large investment in the development of infrastructure, particularly in power generation. An additional priority of the Indonesian government is to ensure equal availability of reliable power supply through the entire Indonesian archipelago. In order to reach these targets, an ambitious program of adding 35 000MW of power generation capacity to their system by 2019 was started in 2015. ?The 500MW of power generation capacity covered in the MoU will help PLN in implementing this program,? Wartsila said.

?Wartsila?s proven capability to deliver high quality, efficient, and flexible power plant solutions on a fast-track basis is perfectly suited to the requirements of Indonesia? says Javier Cavada, President of Wartsila Energy Solutions

Wartsila said it has been present in Indonesia for more than 30 years during which it has installed more than 3GW of power generation capacity. Some of the recent projects using Wartsila?s internal combustion engine technology are the 200MW dual fuel Pesanggaran plant, 184MW Arun power plant and the Bangkanai 150MW power plant.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak