Indonesian Finance Minister Ms Sri Mulyani Indrawati in a press conference last week talked about Indonesia’s domestic market obligation on coal and how the recent coal export ban could have been unnecessary if the domestic coal industry adhered to the DMO. The minister said “But in actuality the DMO was not met because the opportunity in exporting coal is so high with significantly higher value. If Indonesia had a blackout would we still export?”The government imposed the coal export ban on January 1 and will only be lifted on January 31 and argues this is necessary as the domestic coal supply for electricity power plants are at a critical level. This way, the domestic coal industry is asked to supply coal to state-owned electricity firm PLN and independent power producers. The safe amount of supply for PLN to power electricity for millions of its customers is coal supply for 20 operational days, but out of the government’s 5.1 million tonnes assignment, only 35 thousand or less than 1 percent were realized by the coal industry. Moreover, Sri Mulyani said the export ban is intended to preserve domestic supply and insisted that it is a difficult but crucial decision to take.
Indonesian Finance Minister Ms Sri Mulyani Indrawati in a press conference last week talked about Indonesia’s domestic market obligation on coal and how the recent coal export ban could have been unnecessary if the domestic coal industry adhered to the DMO. The minister said “But in actuality the DMO was not met because the opportunity in exporting coal is so high with significantly higher value. If Indonesia had a blackout would we still export?”The government imposed the coal export ban on January 1 and will only be lifted on January 31 and argues this is necessary as the domestic coal supply for electricity power plants are at a critical level. This way, the domestic coal industry is asked to supply coal to state-owned electricity firm PLN and independent power producers. The safe amount of supply for PLN to power electricity for millions of its customers is coal supply for 20 operational days, but out of the government’s 5.1 million tonnes assignment, only 35 thousand or less than 1 percent were realized by the coal industry. Moreover, Sri Mulyani said the export ban is intended to preserve domestic supply and insisted that it is a difficult but crucial decision to take.
