Activists are warning the government to steer clear of building nuclear power plants, citing safety concerns and urging Indonesia to focus on renewable energy instead.

A Greenpeace Indonesia official, Satrio Swandiko, said Indonesia should heed the lessons of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster in Japan, which was caused by an earthquake and tsunami in March 2011.

Greenpeace’s Japan chapter surveyed Fukushima city, as well as the nearby towns of Naraha and Okuma in Fukushima prefecture in October and November 2019. In Fukushima’s city center, Greenpeace found at least 45 radioactive hot spots — 11 of which had radiation levels equal to and even above the Japanese government’s decontamination target of 0.23 microSieverts per hour. It showed that the impact of the nuclear meltdown continued years after the incident.

“Indonesia has a high risk of natural disaster and authorities are lacking in discipline, such as with the recent case of the Batan [National Nuclear Energy Agency] radioactive waste,” Indonesian Forum of the Environment (Walhi) activist Dwi Sawung said on Wednesday. “Building a nuclear power plant in Indonesia is equivalent to activating a time bomb.”

Last month, authorities found radioactive substances in a house in the Batan Indah housing complex, about 5 kilometers from where Batan has several small nuclear reactors it operates for research purposes in South Tangerang, Banten. Police allege that a Batan employee, identified only as SM, had been keeping the radioactive substances at his home for a long time.

Indonesia’s energy policies have indeed been steering away from nuclear plants since then-president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono issued a government regulation in 2014 that declared such plants “a last resort option” to power the country. The regulation instead prioritizes coal, natural gas and renewables, namely geothermal, solar, wind, hydropower, bio and tidal energy, for electricity production.

But the current controversial omnibus bill on job creation may ease the construction of nuclear power plants. The bill would revise a number of provisions in the 1997 Law on nuclear energy to streamline regulations governing investments in nuclear energy.

Satrio said that although the government had yet to issue permits for the nuclear industry, the bill would allow the government to directly appoint anyone to conduct nuclear business.

“[Nuclear energy investment] must currently go through a lot of protocols overseen by multiple agencies, but the bill will transfer such authority solely to the central government,” he said.

So far, there is only one proposal to build an experimental nuclear power plant in Indonesia by American power producer ThorCon International Pte. Ltd. It plans to launch a 500-megawatt floating nuclear power plant in the country by 2027, which would cost about US$1.21 billion.

A Jakarta-based energy think-tank, the Institute for Essential Services Reform (IESR), said the Fukushima disaster sparked a phaseout of nuclear reactors by many developed nations, a step that Indonesia should follow.

The IESR said that in 1996 about 17 percent of electricity in the world was sourced from nuclear. The ratio was reduced to 10.5 percent by 2018.

There are 415 nuclear power plants operating worldwide, while 186 had been closed permanently. At least 46 plants
are under construction, according to IESR.

Nuclear energy is becoming less viable not just because of the growing global demand for renewables and the current trend of phasing out nuclear energy, but also because renewables are getting cheaper, making costs for nuclear energy less competitive.

According to a 2019 study by an asset management firm, Lazard, the levelized costs of electricity (LCOE) of solar power are estimated at between $32 and $44 per megawatt hour (MWh), compared to nuclear at $118 to $198 per MWh.

The IESR, meanwhile, projected that a large solar power plant could produce electricity for $58.40 per MWh, almost at the same level as a supercritical coal-fired power plant (PLTU), which produces it for $57.70 per MWh, an ultra-supercritical PLTU, which produces it for $58.30 per MWh, and a mine-mouth coal-fired power plant, which produces it for $50.10 per MWh.

“This LCOE [of solar power] will further decrease with improvements in policies and regulations, including incentives to eliminate market barriers in the form of a feed-in tariff,” IESR researcher Marlistya Citraningrum said.

Meanwhile, Satrio said: “Nuclear power plants are not an energy solution for Indonesia if it wants to provide affordable energy.”

Yet, Indonesia’s solar energy potential has long been regarded as untapped and its development in the past few years has been sluggish, owing to lack of supportive policies. It is predicted that Indonesia has a combined untapped total of 655 gigawatt peak (GWp) solar potential in 24 provinces.

Marlistya said, however, that solar power and other renewables have a chance to improve, particularly because the House of Representatives is currently drafting a bill on renewable energy, which was included in the 2020 National Legislation Program.

“We hope this is a positive signal to kickstart [renewable energy growth],” she said.

The Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry, meanwhile, aimed to boost Indonesia’s power production capacity to 74,800 megawatts this year, with only 14.5 percent to come from renewables rather than the 19.4 percent stipulated in the National General Energy Planning road map.

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