Jakarta (Indonesia Window) - The Indonesian government plans to add 16.7 gigawatts (GW) within 10 years by developing clean energy-based power plants.

"There are several challenges in developing renewable energy power plants," Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Arifin Tasrif stated at a virtual PLN International Conference on Technology and Policy in Electric Power and Energy 2020 here on Wednesday (Sep 23).

According to Arifin, the first challenge is electricity price from renewable energy-based power plants is not yet competitive compared to that generated from fossil fuel-based plants.

"The price of renewable energy-based power plants is still relatively more expensive than that of conventional generators," he said.

The second challenge is renewable energy-based power plants need to be maintained to ensure their continuity in electricity supply as they are intermittent.

On the other hand, the least cost renewable energy plants with a good capacity factor, such as hydro/minihydro and geothermal power plants, are generally located in conservation areas which are far from the load centers. Therefore, they require relatively long time in development, including for land acquisitions.

Geographical constraints and force majeure such as landslides, earthquakes, and other disasters are also some challenges in the construction of renewable energy-based power plants.

Regarding bioenergy, the minister said, the development of biomass and biogas plants requires a sustainable supply of feedstock during the operation period.

He believed that as a tropical country Indonesia is very suitable and has great potentials in developing renewable energy-based power plants, especially from solar energy.

"It is very possible (to rely on solar energy), because Indonesia is a tropical country. The sun's radiation duration is longer than other countries," Arifin said.

Reporting by Indonesia Window