9 September 2009

New Electricity Bill - Is It Better?

New bill just passed by house of representative yesterday (8/9/09). The new bill is regulating electricity sector. If the president does not sign it, then the bill will not be implemented.

The main feature of this new bill is that regions are given freedom to have their own electricity utility. This is true mainly for areas not in PLN's (Indonesia's Utility) service area. As far as I observed, this bill is just another way for the government to escape from the obligation. Government has to provide energy for the underprivileged communities/areas as mandated in the Energy Bill (30/2007). Since regional governments are basically/usually have little knowledge on the sector and low financial capacity to provide electricity to remote areas or underprivileged areas (that usually are not in the PLN's service area) then there will be no electrification for underprivileged areas. There is no incentive for private sector to get in since providing electricity to remote area means a loss. And if there are areas that are interesting enough for private sector (with local government) to establish a local utility, then the tariff might be very high and eventually gives hard time for economic development. The new bill will not achieve anything except more confusion and chaos. If the president is dare enough, he will not sign the bill.

What we need now is energy conservation and stronger law enforcement on this matter. Better rational use of energy and not wasting rare resources.