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View all search resultsClimate ‘band aids’ are not enough
A comprehensive climate adaptation plan aiming at long term mitigations against extreme weather should be prepared.
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Police regulate vehicle traffic on Jan 29, 2025, during flooding on the Sedyatmo Toll Road, Cengkareng, Jakarta. The toll road, which is the access to Soekarno-Hatta Airport, was flooded 20-30 centimeters high due to the high intensity of rain. (Antara Foto/Putra M. Akbar)
Welcome to January, the time of the year when Jakarta has to endure days of torrential rains and flooding triggered by them.
As the country enters the peak of its annual rainy season, the capital and millions of people in it have been struggling to cope with heavy to extreme rains.
For example, on Jan. 12, the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) recorded rainfall of 235.2 millimeters per day at a weather station in Tanjung Priok in North Jakarta, way exceeding the 100 mm per day threshold of extreme rain set by the weather agency.
The rains were so extreme that they paralyzed the city, deluging roads and highways that have been equipped with drainage systems that have no capacity of handling that much water gushing from the sky at one time.
The Sedyatmo toll road connecting Jakarta and the Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Tangerang, Banten, was among the hardest-hit areas, with motorists facing heavy traffic jams. Extreme rains also forced many flights at the airport to be delayed or diverted to other nearby airports.
Jakarta Governor Pramono Anung has claimed his administration had done much to mitigate the flooding by making sure up to 1,200 pump houses across the city can work properly at the time of extreme weather. The City Hall also allocated an unspecified portion of its regional budget for cloud seeding operation for up to 30 days to prevent more extreme rains in the city.
We appreciate the city administration for its swift actions in responding to the flood, but we are also highlighting that such measures mentioned by Pramono and his office are just “band aids” that will not solve the problem in the long term.
