The Lens of Energy & Sustainability

CLIMATE CHANGE | ENERGY TRANSITION | NET ZERO EMISSION | RENEWABLE ENERGY  

As a part of the efforts in tackling climate crisis, years after agreed to ratifying the Paris Agreement, Indonesia has been moving towards the net-zero emissions, despite the country’s challenges in phasing out coal as a major industrial commodity.

Attempts to positively contribute to fight global warming continue through bilateral relations. Building Indonesia-UK diplomatic relations, the Indonesian Students Association in the UK (PPI UK) hosted ThinkLab Festival 2021, a virtual discussion forum on renewable energy development as a part of global concerns on climate crisis. 

“Diplomacy is not solely owned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the Indonesian Embassy, but belongs to all of us, including students and the diaspora,” the Indonesian Ambassador to the UK, Desra Percaya, said in his remarks.

ThinkLab Project Manager Nadhila Renaldi, a Master of Public Policy from the London School of Economics, said the virtual forum will further strengthen UK – Indonesia bilateral relations and partnership and further promote global efforts on environmental awareness and climate change.

Presided by Indonesia’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Mahendra Siregar and the UK Minister of State for Asia Nigel Adams, the UK – Indonesia diplomatic relations have been well established for more than seven decades and bilateral cooperation continues in the area of health, economy, the environment and energy – particularly in achieving global net zero. 

Owen Jenkins, British Ambassador to Indonesia and Timor Leste, said: “Referring to Paris Agreement, we need to accelerate this transition moving from coal and fossil fuel, five times faster as a global community.”

Referring to Alok Sharma’s visit to Indonesia, Jenkins said that Indonesia played a huge role in renewable energy. With the UK – Indonesia long-standing partnership, he remained optimistic about bringing forward the net-zero target in the energy bilateral relations.  

Dadan Kusdiana, Indonesia’s Director General of New Renewable Energy & Energy Conservation, shared at the forum the latest progress of renewable energy development, pointed out that the country is “in good condition” to achieve net zero-emissions through its ongoing cooperation with the UK.

“Energy is part of a significant contributor to the Paris Agreement commitment. Half of the target is fulfilled through renewable energy while another part is from energy efficiency programme from clean energy. The acceleration of the coal-fired power plant retirement is ongoing,” said Kusdiana.

He pointed out that the current fuel switch program also resulted in better CO2 reduction and Indonesia’s current priorities are to develop green energy strategy, increase energy resilience and improve energy independency and security for domestic product by reducing energy import.

However, some perspective reflected diverse challenges and potential opportunities for Indonesia through a series of interviews with Indonesian graduate students in the UK, all of whom have held various roles and experiences in the energy industry.

The views came from Sankara Cintha Diliaga, who studies Energy Policy at the University of Sussex, Muhammad Luthfi Nur Fakhri at Herriot-Watt University in MSc Renewable energy Development, Ignatius Primadi in MSc Economics & Policy of Energy & Environment at UCL, Indah Sartika Sari in MSc Biodiversity & Conservation at the University of Exeter, and Ilham Negara in MSc Global Strategy and Innovation at the University of Leeds.

Diliaga argued that based on the National Energy Policy, Indonesia has yet to be on track to achieve 23% target. She pointed out that the intermittent Covid-19 pandemic lockdown had disrupted electricity sector that resulted to a significant drop for commercial and industrial use and an increase in residential area due to remote working and learning.

“During the crisis, Indonesia reported surplus electricity supply while maintaining supply and demand of electricity balance is challenging. As you may know, electricity is a unique commodity to be stored in huge quantities, thus balancing supply and demand should be real-time,” Diliaga said.

Ilham Negara from the University of Leeds noted that renewable energy development is still in measured progress due to the high cost of power plant development in the world’s largest archipelago. “We can’t just build power plants in Java, Sumatra, Borneo or other big islands, we have to cover the smaller islands too. It’s economically not feasible.”

Indonesia’s state electricity provider (PLN) – the only company allowed by the constitution to manage energy and has been riddled in years by corruption and mismanagement – has massive debts and to offset those debts, they resort to the use of low-cost energy such as coal and unrenewable energy, which are still difficult to phase out.

Negara refers to Article 33, which prohibits energy privatization and forces PLN to buy electricity from private companies, as private companies can’t sell electricity to customers.

“On the other hand, private companies also covet a feasible energy project, they sell the electricity to PLN with a high cost to get a reasonable investment return. As a result, PLN has to bear the loss. If PLN raises the electricity tariff to keep its return, people can’t afford it. This is why renewable energy is not popular in Indonesia, and we prefer to use cheaper unrenewable energies.”

He proposed the government to allow private sectors to enter the industry, thus creating a healthy professional competition with PLN through competitive electricity price and better technology.

Learning from the UK in the low carbon efforts, Diliaga, Primadi, Lutfhi, Sari and Negara all commended the availability of various courses on low carbon emission pathways in the UK – which is in line with the government and international agenda on combatting climate change.

All five also agreed that UK’s energy policy and the availability of sustainable energy development and renewable energy management courses provide skills and knowledge on formulating policy to support renewable energy, added with existing collaboration between NGOs, think-tanks and academic institutions in renewable energy research and development. [

An international program established in 2019 between Herriot-Watt University and the Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology (ITS) in the fields of marine engineering and sustainable energy is a good example of recognizing the importance of inter-university collaboration.

However, the number of courses related to global energy transition/net-zero emission is still very limited. No vocational high schools in Indonesia have a module in renewable energy technical competency and many of them still prioritise building skills and knowledge for fossil fuels-based competency.

Despite long road ahead to improve human capital in the field of renewable energy technology – and its reliance on the use of coal in many industries – the Indonesian government has put in place a number of regulations that support renewable energy development and this will accelerate the country’s climate actions to achieve net-zero omissions program in 2060.