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What this year’s massive blackout means for electricity sector
Indonesia’s electrification ratio had reached 98.86 percent, with only the most isolated regions lacking power.
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A customer observe displayed shoes during a blackout in Jakarta on Aug. 5. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
T
he six-hour Jakarta blackout on Aug. 4 was this year’s key issue in the electricity sector, prompting the public to raise the ultimate issue: inequality in access to electricity despite the high electrification ratio.
State-owned electricity company PLN attributed the blackout to an accident that knocked down one of two power lines supplying electricity to Jakarta. Unfortunately, the incident occurred while the other line was under maintenance and the city’s emergency power plants at rest.
A month after the blackout, PLN acting president director Sripeni Inten Cahyani told legislators at a House of Representative hearing in Jakarta that the company would build a 101 megawatt (MW) diesel-fired power plant to provide emergency power for the capital and disburse Rp 839 billion (US$58.7 million) in customer compensation.
In response, the public took to social media in expressing outrage at how citizens “outside Java” or “in remote areas” regularly experienced blackouts yet never received as much attention, let alone compensation.
Read also: Major blackout affects millions in Java. Lawsuits are now piling up against PLN
“[Indonesia’s] outer regions frequently experiences blackouts. Why aren’t [netizens] as vicious as now? Do people outside major cities not have deadlines? Not have babies?” tweeted Kendari-born comedian Satriaddin Maharinga Djongki on Aug. 5, also known as Arie Keriting.
Speaking at the same post-blackout hearing with PLN, the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry’s electricity director general, Rida Mulyana, said Indonesia’s electrification ratio had reached 98.86 percent, with only the most isolated regions lacking power. The ratio is the government’s main means of monitoring the electrification of remote regions.
