PLN is concerned with govt plan to privatize PT BA

The state-owned electricity company PLN is concerned with the government plan to privatize the state-owned coal mining company PT Tambang Batubara Bukit Asam (BA) this year.

The Suara Karya daily quoted PLN president Eddi Widiono said that if BA was privatized, it might have to raise its coal selling price to the market level, while PLN's power selling price remained low because it continued to be administered by the government.

The South Sumatera-based BA is the main supplier of coal for the Suralaya coal-fired power plant in West Java. Last year it supplied around 6.5 million tons. But as the export market seems to be more promising, there has been recent signs that BA want to divert coal allocated to the Suralaya plant to the international market. The government plans to sell 49 percent shares in BA this year as part of the country's privatization program.

Eddi said that it would be unfair if the government liberalized the upstream sector like coal, natural gas, geothermal and other forms of primary energy, while it continued to regulate the downstream sector like the power sector.(*)