RI'S OIL RESERVES NOW ONLY ENOUGH FOR 23 YEARS

Bandung, W Java, March 5 (ANTARA) - Indonesia's remaining petroleum reserves are now only enough for 23 years of exploitation, Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar said.

"Besides oil, Indonesia's remaining coal reserves are now only enough for 146 years of exploitation and natural gas for 62 years," the minister told a seminar here on Wednesday.
Witoelar said that coal would be further exploited in connection with the government's program to build power plants with a combined capacity of 10,000 MW, where some of the plants would use coal.
For this purpose, he said, there was need for saving the use of fossil-based fuels because this energy sources would sooner or later be depleted.
He said that wise and economical use of fossil fuels and the development of renewable energy were the best step in developing the country's sustainable energy resources.
Witoelar said that Indonesia needed to prepare effective, practical and alternative energy resources that needed to be distributed equitably to the rural areas.
Otherwise, he said, villagers would look for their own energy sources, for example, collecting fire woods in the forest and this would further increase CO2 emission to the air and would increase the green house effect.
The minister said that the biggest challenge facing Indonesia in the energy sector was how to develop a renewable energy research which could increase its economic viability.
"This can be made with a five to ten year plan before Indonesia could utilize a renewable energy sources," he said.
During the seminar which was held at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) campus, the minister offered a solution seen from various sectors of development.
Among the sectors were transportation, construction, spatial planning and industry. He suggested mass rapid transportation (MRT) system, low carbon architecture, national spatial planning and the 3R scheme, namely reduce, reuse and recycle