Indonesia to Deploy 100 Energy Patriots for Rural Electrification

MINISTRY OF ENERGY AND MINERAL RESOURCES

REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA

PRESS RELEASE

NUMBER: 209.Pers/04/SJI/2021

Date: 19 June 2021

Indonesia to Deploy 100 Energy Patriots for Rural Electrification

The Indonesian government will provide assistance for villages that do not yet have electricity by optimizing the use of New, Renewable Energy (NRE). The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (EMR) will deploy 100 youths in a program called Energy Patriot.

Director General of New, Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation (NREEC) of Ministry of EMR, Dadan Kusdiana, said the program had been set up to support the accelerated increase in village electrification ratio, by providing electricity access to villages in Frontier, Outermost, and Least Developed regions and Transmigration areas (4T).

"We'd like to provide an opportunity to young generation who have a social spirit, who are active, intelligent, and passionate, and have the motivation to actively participate in the development of rural electrification," said Dadan during the launching of the Energy Patriot Program on Friday (18/6).

Energy Patriots, continued Dadan, are expected to encourage the improvement of community welfare based on local primary energy. "A similar program had also been run by DG NREEC in collaboration with People Centered Business and Economic Institute (IBEKA) Foundation in 2015 and 2016," said Dadan.

At that time, around 200 youths were educated and trained by Ministry of EMR for capacity building and community empowerment in NRE utilization. "Our considerations in the rerun of the Energy Patriot program are, first, there are still households without electricity or those that have electricity but the supply is on for less than 12 hours," said Dadan.

The next consideration is that there are still 433 villages that are in complete darkness and 5,231 villages with low quality, off-grid electricity, as well as 5,200 diesel power plants still operated by state electricity utility PLN which are planned to be converted to renewable energy power plants.

Still, another consideration is that the energy-saving solar lamp program which was run between 2016 and 2018 had ended. Additionally, not all NRE infrastructure projects which were financed by State Budget were handed over to regional governments while others were out of order.

"Revitalization is needed, and there are also plans to accelerate electricity provision to the public in 2021. The public needs to be assisted so that they know how to use and manage the facilities. These conditions will be considerably improved if the Energy Patriot program is rerun," Dadan concluded. (IY)

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