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Jokowi’s plan to use B40 biodiesel by 2021 difficult to realize: Experts
Expert have contended that the government is carried away by ambition with its plan to make the use of B40 biodiesel mandatory starting next year, as refiners may fail to produce enough palm oil-derived fuel.
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The government plans to issue a regulation on the use of a 40-percent biodiesel ( B40 ) mix starting next year. (Shutterstock/File)
E
xperts have expressed doubt about President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s plan to increase the palm oil content in biodiesel to 40 percent on a mass scale by next year from 30 percent at present. They say producers may fail to meet the increase in demand and the quality standards.
Indonesian Bioenergy Expert Association (IKABI) chairman Tatang Herman said it would take more than a year to prepare for the processing facilities to enable them to meet the technical requirements to produce biodiesel with 40 percent palm oil content.
“The preparation for B30 started back in 2014, and the regulation was issued in 2015. That provides a lot of time for producers to prepare. However, the decision to upgrade to B40 is way too sudden,” he said in a public discussion on Friday.
In January, Indonesia began the mandatory use of B30 biodiesel, which contains 30 percent palm oil-derived fuel, after launching B20 biodiesel in late 2018.
Indonesia’s B30 is believed to be the highest mandatory biodiesel blend in the world.
The policy is meant to increase renewable energy usage and to reduce oil imports while at the same time boosting domestic demand for palm oil, one of Indonesia’s key export products. A major palm oil producer, Indonesia has been struggling to find new palm oil export markets since the European Union began reducing its imports over environmental concerns.
To produce B40 biodiesel, the local biodiesel refineries need to process at least 13 million kiloliters (kl) of pam oil into fatty acid methyl esters (FAME), which will be used in biodiesel.
