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Electric cars projected to boost renewable energy-use

The government is looking to kill two birds with one stone by boosting the domestic use of electric cars, a move it expects will reduce carbon emissions and enhance renewable energy-use in the long run

Fedina S. Sundaryani and Viriya P. Singgih (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, August 8, 2017

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Electric cars projected to boost renewable energy-use

T

he government is looking to kill two birds with one stone by boosting the domestic use of electric cars, a move it expects will reduce carbon emissions and enhance renewable energy-use in the long run.

Although the government had set a target of 10.4 percent of all energy to be sourced from renewable sources by the end of last year, the actual figure achieved was quite low at only 7.7 percent, prompting the National Energy Board’s (DEN) to intervene at the implementation level.

In the latest move, an inter-ministerial team, with the close-assistance of DEN, is currently drafting a presidential regulation (Perpres) to provide various support for electric cars, including in terms of taxation.

Through the new regulation, the government expects to gradually reduce the use of fossil fuels and boost the utilization of renewable sources to generate electricity needed for such cars, in line with its commitment to slash the country’s greenhouse-gas output by 29 percent by 2030.

“Electric cars can boost the use of renewable energy if they use electricity generated from renewable sources. It is going to be useless if the electricity comes from coal-fired or gas-fired power plants,” DEN member Rinaldy Dalimi said on Friday.

Hence, he said it was important for the country to expedite efforts to master the manufacturing of electric car batteries and solar cells, which are easier to build in big cities compared to other renewable energy facilities such as the hydro or geothermal.

“In France, for instance, solar cells have been used to charge electric cars,” Rinaldy said.

The Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry’s new and renewable energy director general, Rida Mulyana, said, at present, high prices of solar electricity remained a hindrance to realizing such a plan.

However, he believed that the manufacturing of solar power technologies would become more advanced in the future, resulting in lower prices of solar electricity.

According to Bloomberg, solar-powered electricity costs have fallen by 99 percent since 1976 and 90 percent since 2009 while the cost of wind-powered generation has fallen by half since 2009.

“If the electric cars can be powered directly from renewable sources, the reduction in carbon emissions can be boosted further,” Rida said.

In the first half of this year, Indonesia slashed 33 million tons from its carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, nearly achieving the year’s total target of 33.6 million tons. The figure has already exceeded the 29.2 million ton reduction recorded last year.

Nonetheless, Rida said there was still a challenge in terms of battery charging for electric cars that could take hours, meaning dedicated charging stations would be required in public places or at the houses of the car owners.

Previously, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Ignasius Jonan proposed the idea that electric car owners could exchange their empty batteries with fully-recharged ones in exchange for a certain fee at small battery shops, built by state electricity firm PLN, in each of the existing 6,000 gas stations across the country.

“It will be our responsibility to manage battery charging and we have taken steps toward realizing such a plan in the future,” PLN corporate planning director Syofvi Felienty Roekman said.

According to the latest General Planning for National Energy (RUEN), renewable energy is set to account for 23 percent of the national energy mix by 2025. The RUEN also envisions that Indonesia will produce 2,200 electric cars and 2.1 million electric motorbikes by 2025.

To meet the target, PLN aims to develop renewable power plants with a total capacity of 21,549 megawatts (MW) between 2017 and 2026, 57.3 percent of which will come from hydro power facilities and 29.2 percent from geothermal facilities, as stated in its latest electricity procurement business plan (RUPTL).

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