TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search resultsIdle oil and gas projects risk losing licenses, Bahlil warns
The energy minister has taken an "all stick, no carrot" strategy to pressure firms into start pumping oil and gas from stalled projects, threatening hundreds of wells with the prospect of losing their permits.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
The sun sets beyond an oil and gas rig operated by Saka Energi Muriah Limited, a wholly owned subsidiary of state gas company PGN, in the Kepodang Field of the Muriah Block off Semarang, Central Java, in this undated handout photo. (SKK Migas/SKK Migas.)
E
nergy and Mineral Resources Minister Bahlil Lahadalia is putting pressure on oil and gas producers to make progress on stalled projects as he warned that hundreds of abandoned areas stood to lose their operating licenses.
“There are 301 working areas that have been explored but have yet to commence [operations]. We are now giving [the concession holders] an ultimatum. If they don’t start operating, we will revoke their licenses,” Bahlil told a panel discussion during the Indonesia Economic Outlook 2026 on Friday at the Wisma Danantara Indonesia, the South Jakarta headquarters of state asset fund Danantara.
Bahlil remarked that the government had previously tried a similar approach with investors, threatening them with ultimatums to push them to realize their investments.
He cited as an example the gas-rich Masela Block managed by Japanese oil and gas giant Inpex, noting that it showed little progress over its 26-year concession.
“However, after they received the ‘love letter’, alhamdulillah [praise be to God], now the investment of around US$18 billion has begun. So I think this is what we will do going forward,” the minister said.
The country has experienced a long-term decline in oil production since nationwide output peaked at 1.5-1.6 million barrels per day (mbpd) in 1996-1997, gradually falling thereafter to 580,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 2024. Meanwhile, the government’s oil lifting targets have regularly gone unmet since 2016.
However, Bahlil noted that realized production of 605,300 bpd in 2025 marginally surpassed that year’s budget target of 605,000 bpd, marking the first time the national lifting target had been met in nearly a decade.
