Geothermal is highly potential , renewable, clean and available in abundance in the country, Agus said here on Saturday.
Indonesia has the largest geothermal reserves in the world but most of the reserves remain untapped largely on difficulty in finance and technology.
Agus said he hoped the development of geothermal energy such as in the Mount Ungaran concession could be carried out smoothly.
He said Mount Ungaran holds potential renewable energy source of geothermal, adding there are five geothermal concessions in Central Java alone but only the Dieng concession has been operational.
Indonesia begins to be aggressive in developing renewable energy including water energy, geothermal solar energy and wind energy. The country already have a number of large hydroelectric plants mainly in Sumatra and Java.
Greenpeace has expressed the hope that the government would continue to develop renewable energy . The non governmental organization appreciated the operation of wind energy power generating facility (PLTB) in Sidrap, South Sulawsi recently.
"Unlike coal fired power plant, PLTB causes no air pollution and damage to the environment, triggers no public protest, has no problem over land procurement and in fuel supply . And most important is that it causes no damage to earth climate," spokesman of Greenpeace Indonesia, Didit Haryo, said.
The 75-megawatt capacity PLTB that could supply power to 70,000 houses is a good example of environmentally friendly power generating, Didit said.
Greenpeace said it hopes the PLTB Sidrap would not be the first such project at the same time the last to be developed by the government.
It hopes that development of power plants fired with clean energy would continue to phase out coal fired plants which cause heavy air pollution. Coal fired power plants still dominate power production in the country.
The commissioning and operation of the PLTB in Sidrap should mark the start of big steps toward development of clean energy in Indonesia, it said.
(T.SYS/B/H-ASG/A014) 14-07-2018 16:23:18
Reporter: .
Editor: Fardah Assegaf
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