Industry Uses 51% of Island’s Subsidized Diesel: Survey

Tunggadewa Mattangkilang

Balikpapan, East Kalimantan. Fifty-one percent of subsidized diesel in South and East Kalimantan is used by vehicles with more than six wheels with the remaining 49 percent used by four-wheel vehicles, a survey has suggested.

State oil and gas firm Pertamina conducted a three-day survey of more than 2,000 vehicles at 12 gas stations in the area earlier this month.

“Our survey measured four parameters of the types of vehicles that bought subsidized diesel fuel from gas stations. They were vehicles with more than six wheels, which indicated they are industry-owned; non-industry six-wheel vehicles; non-industry four-wheel vehicles; and industry four-wheel vehicles,” Bambang Irianto, Pertamina’s external assistant manager for marketing, said on Wednesday in Balikpapan.

Bambang said that around 70 percent of the subsidized diesel in South Kalimantan was consumed by industry-owned vehicles with the remaining 30 percent by non-industry vehicles.

In East Kalimantan, 70 percent of subsidized diesel is consumed by four-wheel vehicles and 30 percent by six-wheel vehicles. Many vehicles bought full tanks of the subsidized fuel up to four times, equivalent to about 100 to 200 liters.

Bambang said the survey also showed that mining areas such as Kutai Kartanegara, East Kalimantan, and Loktabat in South Kalimantan consumed the most subsidized diesel.

“This reflects on poor supervision by [upstream oil and gas regulator] BPMigas and the government and other related institutions over the misuse of subsidized fuel. This is homework for all us in the future,” he said.

Bambang said he would submit the survey report to Pertamina’s headquarters in Jakarta and the government for further action. “We will report the result to the headquarters first and then draft the supervision [measure],” he said.

Bambang added that Pertamina’s Kalimantan unit would increase its number of oil tankers to meet the high non-subsidized fuel demand from mining, forestry and plantation companies on the island.