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Blackout to continue due to faulty power plants
Just two weeks after stating that the rotating power outage had ended, the Bali branch of state-owned electricity monopoly PT PLN announced it had decided to resume blackouts due to an overheating power plant
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ust two weeks after stating that the rotating power outage had ended, the Bali branch of state-owned electricity monopoly PT PLN announced it had decided to resume blackouts due to an overheating power plant.
The company said it had to halt the operation of the Gilimanuk power plant starting Friday due to an unexpected rise in temperature in the power plant’s generators. The power plant had just undergone routine maintenance.
During maintenance, the plant could not supply the island with power and PLN was forced to implement rotating blackouts to cope with the decreased supply.
PLN spokesman Agung Mastika said the company would not take the risk of further damage to the power plant, and had opted to continue the blackouts indefinitely.
“We fear the damage would get worse [if we continued running the generator]. That’s why we halted operations in Gilimanuk,” Mastika said.
“We haven’t identified the cause of the rising temperature. Our technicians are still checking the generators, but we are trying to finish the repair as soon as possible,” he said.
The rotating blackout, which has plagued consumers for months, started on Oct. 10 last year.
It was scheduled to have ended on Dec. 6, but was extended until early this month due to unfinished repairs.
The power plant contributes 130 megawatts (MW) to the island’s total consumption of 493 MW.
Putu Armaya, head of Bali’s consumer protection body, expressed his exasperation with the continued blackouts.
He said PLN should have made the most of the two-month maintenance period, including conducting trials.
He said when the blackout occurred again for around two-and-a-half hours last Friday, he immediately telephoned PLN as he had received many complaints from consumers.
“PLN said they encountered a problem at the Gilimanuk plant. We asked PLN to publicly disclose whether the blackouts would continue,” he said.
He also called on the provincial administration and councilors to actively take part in looking for alternative energy supplies, either from PLN or from other sources.
“We are all aware that Bali has limited sources of energy.
Therefore, the provincial administration should find alternative solutions.
“The administration should consider reactivating the idle of Nusa Penida solar energy project, as well as the wind energy project,” he suggested.
He said he would write to the Bali governor and the province’s council speaker. “We will ask them to discuss this problem with related stakeholders, including NGOs.”
Apart from advocating alternative energy sources, he said the consumer protection group would also press PLN to compensate consumers by initiating a class action over the rotating blackout.
Armaya added that by implementing the blackout, PLN violated the 1999 Consumer Protection Law.
Under this law, violators can be charged with five years imprisonment and Rp 2 billion in fines.
The blackout also violated the 2002 decree issued by the Directorate General of Energy Use regarding level of service, he added.
“In our lawsuit, we have asked PLN to compensate by reducing the electricity bills for all consumers by at least 10 percent for one month. We feel this is a reasonable demand, but we have not received any
response.”
