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More Jakartans enjoy convenience of gas networks at home
CM Sri Suhartati, a 68-year-old woman living in Perumnas Klender in East Jakarta, said she no longer had to stop cooking whenever her liquified petroleum gas (LPG) canister ran out
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CM Sri Suhartati, a 68-year-old woman living in Perumnas Klender in East Jakarta, said she no longer had to stop cooking whenever her liquified petroleum gas (LPG) canister ran out.
Nor does she have to go to a nearby kiosk to buy a new canister.
Since 2016, Sri has been using piped natural gas from state-owned gas distributor PT Perusahaan Gas Negara (PGN). She said she did not regret making the switch.
“Pipelined gas is cheaper and more convenient. The service allows me to have unlimited access to natural gas, so I would never run out of gas,” she told The Jakarta Post on Monday.
She added that almost all her neighbors in neighborhood unit (RT) 9 had switched to using the piped gas because of its convenience.
Muhammad Taufik Hidayat, Sri’s next-door neighbor, said he used to spend around Rp 140,000 (US$10) a month buying 12-kilogram canisters of LPG, but now he spent around Rp 100,000 per month to pay for piped gas.
“Sometimes, the volume of gas we get is not what it says on the canister. Several years ago, I bought a 12-kg LPG canister refill, but it only contained around half the amount. This would not happen with pipelined gas” he said.
Another resident of Perumnas Klender, Rahmat, said he had decided to use pipelined gas because it was safer and more cost-efficient.
“Pipelined gas is safer than the common LPG canister. Whenever I leave my house for a long period of time, I simply close the gas valve and the gas will stop running to my house. That way, I don’t have to worry about gas leaks in my house when I’m away,” he said, adding that after using the service, he managed to cut down on his monthly gas expenses from Rp 157,000 to between Rp 35,000 and Rp 50,000.
Despite these benefits, Sri said the service came with a downside. She conceded that it had been expensive for her to install the necessary piping in her home.
“I paid around Rp 3.5 million for the gas installation. It took two to three days for PGN to install the pipelines in my neighborhood,” she said.
The rising shift in people using LPG canisters to pipelined natural gas has helped reduce Indonesia’s imports on LPG, which amounts to more than 5 million tons a year or 60 percent of the country’s consumption.
The Downstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Agency (BPH Migas) tariff regulatory section head, Irawan Bayu Kusuma, said the gas network program that connected gas pipelines to households helped reduce LPG imports by Rp 18.08 billion per month in 2018.
The national gas network program was launched in 2009 and has connected gas pipelines to 468,229 households in 16 provinces. The government is targeting to connect 5 million households to gas pipelines by 2025.
According to PGN corporate secretary Rahmat Hutama, his company offers a much lower gas price compared to LPG. He said that households only needed to pay Rp 4,250 for every cubic meter of natural gas.
He said that most households use one 12-kg LPG canister or four 3-kg canisters per month, which is equal to 15 cbm of natural gas. Currently, 12 kg of LPG refills cost around Rp 140,000 and four canisters of 3 kg refills cost Rp 80,000, while 15 cbm of natural gas costs Rp 63,750. This means pipelined gas is 20 to 54 percent cheaper than LPG.
Rahmat also said that natural gas was safer than LPG as the density of natural gas was lighter than air, so it would float to air ventilation during a leak. Canned propane gas is heavier than air, which means it accumulates near the floor when there is a leak.
He encouraged people to use pipelined gas as it was not imported, and the government was currently providing free gas installation services to households in several areas through the Jargas Program.
Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry spokesman Agung Pribadi said this year, the government would provide 78,216 households with pipelined gas for free, including stoves.
In cooperating with PT Nindya Karya, the ministry plans to build 6,230 new household gas networks in Depok and 6,720 household gas networks in Bekasi, according to the official ministry website. (nal)
