Governor Pledges Electrification Off All Vilages In North Maluku

Ternate, May 17 (Antara) - The provincial administration of North Maluku pledged to finish the program of rural electrification in the province in 2015. Governor Thaib Armaiyn said electrification has covered only 70 percent of more than 1,300 villages in 10 regencies in the province. "Electrification of the remaining 30 percent would hopefully be completed not later than 2015," Thaib said here on Friday. The program would be carried out in cooperation with the energy and mineral resources ministry. This year implementation of the program would cover 32 villages financed by the central government and the regional administration, Thaib said. He said the provincial administration had long planned implementation of the program but it was not easy for the state electricity company PLN to build transmission networks to cover all of the many small islands that make up the province. Now the problem would be coped with by building solar power generating plants on all of the islands, he said. He said the regional administration would also encourage the use of other alternative sources of energy such as geothermal to meet growing demand for power including from households and small industries in North Maluku. There is already an investor building a geothermal power plant with a capacity of 20 megawatts in the regency of West Halmahera, he said. If the power plant has been in operation, it would be able to supply enough power for the household and industries in the whole of Halmahera island, he added. Another investor has also indicated interest in building a geothermal power plant in the regency of South Halmahera to meet demand for electricity in that district, he said. Meanwhile, PT. PLN is building a steam powered electricity plant with a capacity of 14 MW on the island of Tidore to meet power requirement for households and industries on the island and the city of Ternate.