Linking Indonesia’s archipelago using subsea transmission corridors is deemed crucial for network interconnections that will enable the development of renewables and distribute electricity to industrial demand centers.

The agreement, which was signed by the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry and Sun Cable, was an important step for the government to learn from the company’s expertise in solar energy generation and long-distance transmission as the country shapes its policy and technical approach to inter-island connectivity, said Sun Cable CEO David Griffin.

Sun Cable is an Australian-Singaporean company backed by billionaires Mike Cannon-Brookes and Andrew Forrest.

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“Energy infrastructure is very important to connect the centers of great energy production to centers of high energy consumption,” Energy Minister Arifin Tasrif said in the same statement released on Wednesday. “Thus, Indonesia is planning to build a super grid to address a mismatch between renewable energy resources and the location of areas of high electricity demand.”

Renewable sources of energy, such as wind and solar, have intermittent characteristics that are likely to change the way electricity is supplied by the grid operator. Improving grid capacity, which involves both technical capacity and human capital, is crucial to accelerating the deployment of renewable energy technologies.

“Part of our commitment to Indonesia is to look at the potential and possible involvement in developing large-scale renewable energy projects in the country,” Sun Cable president director Tim Anderson told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

Read also: Sun Cable to invest $2.5b in Indonesia for subsea power line

Both parties today released the preliminary findings of a joint study revealing the importance of outlining a pathway for green industrial development in five key industries: mining and minerals processing, energy and fuels, transportation manufacturing, food processing and agriculture, as well as information technology infrastructure.

The five industries represent 30 percent of the nation’s GDP.

The joint study is set to be completed in early 2023. In the next step, the energy ministry and Sun Cable will focus on evaluating specific transmission corridors and the investment required.

“The work that we’re doing is the beginning of many, many years of work,” Georgie Skipper, Sun Cable's chief corporate and government affairs officer, told the Post on Tuesday. She referred to the company’s 5,000-kilometer subsea power line project that links Singapore to Australia. 

“In Indonesia, we’re working really closely with [stakeholders] to secure long-term economic partnerships and provide the expertise that we gain from the project to support Indonesia’s decarbonization agenda in the energy sector.”

The project, called the Australia-Asia PowerLink (AAPowerLink), will connect customers in Singapore to a 17 to 20-gigawatt solar farm – the biggest in the world – in Australia. The farm will also have an energy storage system with a capacity of 36 to 42-gigawatt hours.

The AAPowerLink project will not supply electricity to consumers in Indonesia.

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