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No Quick End in Sight To Jakarta Blackouts
Reva Sasistiya & Ulma Haryanto | November 05, 2009

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Ailing state electricity utility PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) conceded on Thursday that it was in “a difficult situation” with rolling blackouts expected to continue to plague parts of Greater Jakarta for at least another month.

PLN has been struggling to meet the energy-hungry capital’s demand for power since a fire at its central facility in Cawang, East Jakarta, in September. Since Monday, large swathes of the city have been without electricity after a power station in Muara Karang, North Jakarta, overloaded. That failure, in turn, was caused by a breakdown in one of the transformers in a station in Gandul, Depok.

“With Cawang being inoperable, we’ve been channeling electricity from stations in Depok, Bekasi and Tanjung Priok,” said Purnomo Willy, general manager of distribution for PLN.

“However, the Tanjung Priok station has been undergoing scheduled maintenance since mid-October,” he said. “We’re afraid that the blackouts in Jakarta and Tangerang will continue until the end of November.”

Blackouts on Tuesday and Wednesday mainly affected North Jakarta, but other parts of the city were left without power for as long as five hours.

Ratna Budiarti, a housewife from Jati Padang near Kemang, South Jakarta, told the Jakarta Globe that her infant couldn’t sleep in the stifling heat, making for an extremely long and unpleasant five hours alone in her home during the blackout.

PLN had failed to inform the public about the blackouts, how long they would last or if they were expected to continue.

WIlly said that combined with an increase in demand in recent months, transformers and stations in Jakarta were prone to overloading, which could lead to further blackouts.

“I hope that the people of Jakarta will use less electricity, because we are in a difficult situation,” he said.

Willy said both Jakarta and Tangerang faced power shortages of between 16 to 70 megawatts for at least another three weeks.