After one year in limbo, DEN has new independent members
After being left in limbo for more than one year, the National Energy Council (DEN) will function to safeguard the country’s energy transition after the government finally nominated 16 candidates for DEN’s independent board members. The House last week selected eight out of 16 candidates for the board members.
The eight board members are Agus Puji Prasetyono and Musri (representing academics), Satya Widya Yudha and Herman Darnel Ibrahim (representing industry players), Daryatmo Mardiyanto and Eri Purnomohadi (representing consumers), As Natio Lasman (representing technologists) and Yusra Khan (representing environmentalists).1
The DEN is a government agency led by the president, vice president and the energy and mineral resources minister, with 15 members, seven of whom are representatives of seven supporting ministries and the other eight are independent members representing five different stakeholders.
President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo is expected to confirm the appointment of the newly selected eight independent board members soon to make DEN functional after more than one year of being deliberately left in limbo after the 2014-2019 members concluded their tenure mid last year.
In January 2019, President Jokowi proposed 16 names to participate in the House’s confirmation test. The House’s Commission VII was supposed to pick eight names, and yet, it rejected all the names, saying they were all unqualified for the job, requiring the government to repeat the selection process.2 Our sources said then the House had deliberately rejected all the candidates because certain political parties in the ruling coalition wished to place their members who had lost in the 2019 legislative election on the board. That angered Jokowi who refused to submit new candidates until recently.
Such a power play is understandable due to the strategic position and power the board holds, tempting political parties to seek to control such influence. Headed by the President himself, the board has the power to design and revise the national energy policy (KEN) – a policy framework that describes how the country will fulfill its national energy needs, which energy sources to develop and utilize and ensures the availability of energy reserves in the country.
Energy experts have called on the new DEN members to revisit KEN and also the National General Energy Plan (RUEN) – which identifies Indonesia’s long-term energy management strategies to achieve KEN – to strengthen energy transition toward carbon neutrality by increasing the targets for renewable energy by 2050. On the RUEN road map, the government stipulates that renewable energy should make up at least 23 percent of the total energy mix by 2025 and at least 31 percent by 2050.
President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono established DEN back in 2009 based on Energy Law No. 30/2007, a legal basis for Indonesia's energy policies, both for the upstream and downstream sectors.
In 2014, DEN released the 2014-2050 KEN, in which several targets were set for the period by DEN and approved by the House. One of DEN's primary responsibilities is to devise the RUEN to achieve such targets and to make sure relevant institutions, including state-owned electricity company PLN and state-owned oil and gas holding company Pertamina, work together toward that goal.
The worst progress so far has been the government's performance in achieving the renewable energy target in the country’s energy mix. As stated in the KEN, renewable energy must constitute 23 percent of all energy production by 2025. The government has devised a number of polices to achieve the target, including the introduction of palm oil-based biodiesel, electric cars and the development of renewable power plants.
However, as of May, renewable power plants in Indonesia were only able to produce 10.4 gigawatts (GW) of electricity or about 14.2 percent of the total capacity of all installed power plants – compared to around 60 percent from coal-based power plants.3
To help achieve the targets by 2025, the government plans to increase demand for electricity from renewable energy through the Renewable Energy Based Industrial Development (REBID) program by integrating renewable power plants, mostly hydro and geothermal power plants, with industrial complex.
Hydropower plants that would be developed through the REBID scheme include Kayan in North Kalimantan with 9,000 megawatts (MW), which will be integrated with a manufacturing industrial complex, and Mentarang, also in North Kalimantan with 1,375MW to be integrated with a smelter plant. Meanwhile, geothermal power plants include Hamiding and Jailolo in Halmahera with 230 MW, to be integrated with a smelter, Blawan Ijen in East Java with 165MW and Arjuno Welirang also in East Java with 180MW.4
The government also pursues the Renewable Energy Based Economic Development (REBED) program by building renewable energy, specifically solar panels and biomass, and micro-grid in remote and border areas, as well as replacing the existing diesel power plants with total capacity of 2 GW with renewable energy.5
To attract more private investment, the government plans to issue a presidential regulation on renewable energy later this year. The anticipated regulation is set to govern the pricing and procurement of new and renewable energy and set green energy incentives, among other provisions.6
A government official has said that, from the beginning, the reshuffle in the selection of National Energy Council (DEN) board members is intended to cater to those who failed in the previous selection process. The re-selection would also accommodate politicians who failed in the 2019 legislative elections.
Some politicians rumored to have benefited from this are Satya Widya Yudha and Daryatmo Mardiyanto. Satya is a former member of the House of Representatives Commission VII as a member of the Golkar Party, while Daryatmo is a former member of the same commission as a member of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P).
The selection process was supposed to finish by the end of last year. From the 16 candidates, the House is supposed to choose eight as the DEN board members.
After holding a confirmation hearing, the House asked to revise the regulation on DEN and hold another selection process. They proposed changing Energy Law No. 30/2017 through a letter to President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo on July 12, 2019.
The selection process for the initial 16 names met a dead end after the House ended up requesting new names for candidates.
Another source added that the House’s request to repeat the selection process seemed to have gained approval by the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry and the State Palace. Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Arifin Tasrif is even rumored to have disregarded the Indonesian Ombudsman letter that questioned the lack of progress in the last selection process. President Jokowi also reportedly disregarded a letter from the 16 DEN candidates who went through the previous selection process.
PREV NEXT