More Competitive Price, Key to Indonesia’s One Million Rooftop Solar Systems

MINISTRY OF ENERGY AND MINERAL RESOURCES

REPUBLIC OF INDONESIA

PRESS RELEASE

NUMBER: 273.Pers/04/SJI/2020

Date: 26 September 2020

More Competitive Price, Key to Indonesia's One Million Rooftop Solar Systems

Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (EMR) is optimistic with the target to install one million rooftop solar systems. This optimism is driven by global development in the prices of solar panel which show an increasingly competitive trend.

Director General of Electricity of Ministry of EMR, Rida Mulyana, said that the National Movement of One Million Rooftop Solar Systems introduced clean and environmentally friendly energy to the public.

"This movement highly supports the realization of the 23% target in new and renewable energy by 2025," said Mulyana at the Third Year Reflection of the National Movement of One Million Rooftop Solar Systems (GNSSA) held virtually on Thursday (24/9).

Mulyana also said that the presence of GNSSA will grow the domestic industries related to goods and services procurement for solar power system.

Director of Energy Conservation of Directorate General of New, Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation, Hariyanto, further explained that the Ministry of EMR is taking an inventory of rooftop utilization for solar panel installation.

"Our inventory is conducted not only at residential buildings but also at commercial buildings such as hotels, hospitals, office buildings, airports, ports, and warehouses. The results show that, for the time being, there is quite large potential for rooftop solar systems," said Hariyanto on the same occasion.

The government is coordinating with various relevant parties to realize the movement immediately. "Hopefully, if we can realize it, we can break the psychological level of one million rooftops, because actually we designed 500,000 to 1 million rooftops in the first year of planning," he explained.

Hariyanto said the government is optimistic that the 1 million target can be realized because the regulations on the use of new, renewable energy have been improved and electricity prices from renewable energy are quite competitive.

Data compiled by DG NREEC show that the cost of rooftop solar system has sharply declined in a 10 year period (2010-2019) by around 82%. In fact, the generating cost of utility-scale PV system has decreased by 13% year-on-year, reaching around seven cents (USD 0.068) per kilo Watt hour (kWh) in 2019.

"For solar energy, the government believes that we can realize the target because the price is competitive, solar energy can be used as cost recovery during the pandemic, and the operation is labor intensive," he said.

Hariyanto added the dissemination of the use of green energy will continue to be carried out widely to further motivate people to switch from conventional energy.

In the three years since GNSSA has been launched, the number of PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (Persero)'s customers who use rooftop solar system has increased from 268 in 2017 to more than 2,346 in mid-2020. The total capacity of rooftop solar system reaches 11.5 Mega Watt (MW).

GNSAA was declared on September 17, 2017 by Ministry of EMR and solar energy activists. This movement has become a unifying vehicle for policy makers, business actors, and stakeholders of solar energy to collaborate. The government through Ministry of EMR issued Regulation of Minister of EMR Number 49 on 2018 which became the legal umbrella for users of rooftop solar system. The regulation was later revised to reduce parallel costs for industrial customers. (IY)

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