PTBA, Indonesia Power to build power plant
Saturday, February 24 2001 - 04:30 AM WIB
State own coal mining company PT Tambang Batubara Bukit Asam (PT BA) and Indonesia Power (IP), a subsidiary of state electricity company PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN), have teamed up to build a coal-powered power plant at Banjarsari in Lahat district, South Sumatra.
PT BA president Soenardi and IP president Fisdaus Akmal signed in Jakarta on Friday (Feb. 23) a cooperation agreement to build the power plant, located right next to PT BA's coal mining site, with capacity of 2 X 100 megawatt or 1 X 250 megawatt.
Firdaus explained that the power plant would cost them around US$160 million.
He noted that with the current calculation, the electricity produced by the power plant would be sold at prices around 3.2 U.S. cents per kilowatt per hour.
Soenardi said that the power plant project was still open for other parties' participation, including from local administrations that had expressed their interests to own a stake at the project. In addition, the project had also been offered to foreign investors.
But the requirement for investors to enter the project was that their bidding price must be low enough so that it would not make the selling price of the electricity become more expensive.
"As long as they will not make the selling price more expensive, we will welcome them," he said.
Electricity produced from the power plant would be sold to customers in surrounding areas, mainly in South Sumatra. Both Firdaus and Soenardi expressed their confidence that all electricity produced by the power plant would be absorbed by consumers. (*)