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The government's policy of limiting coal exports to about 150
million tons a year will last until 2025 in order to meet the surging
demand from domestic buyers, a senior official at the Energy and
Mineral Resources Ministry says.
Simon Sembiring, the director general of mineral, coal and geothermal
energy, said Tuesday in Jakarta that the policy had been adopted to
ensure sufficient supplies on the domestic market.
"Domestic demand will raise significantly when dozens of coal-fired
power plants begin operation in 2010," he was quoted as saying by
Antara.
He said that in 2010, the country's coal production would amount to
about 240 million tons a year, of which some 90 million tons would be
sold to domestic buyers, with the remaining 150 million tons being
available for export.
He said that while it was expected that annual coal production would
increase to 380 million tons by 2025, exports would still be limited to
150 million tons as the other 220 million tons would be allocated to
the domestic market to meet demand from industrial users.
"The export cap could be lower than 150 million tons if the demand from
local users is higher than the initial projection," Simon added.
In 2008, the country's total coal production is expected to reach 198
millions, two million tons higher than the estimated output this year.
Simon noted that the projected two million tons increase in production
would be quite realistic given the current level of demand both from
overseas and local buyers.
"Projecting an output increase of more than two million tons would be
too high, and could also cause prices to decline," he added.
State electricity utility PT Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) will
become the country's top coal buyer in the coming years.
Under the so-called "crash program", PLN is currently building a number
of coal-fired power plants to provide an additional power supply of
10,000 megawatts by the end of 2009.
The demand from other industrial users, such as cement producers and
smelting plants, is also on the rise as most of them are switching to
cheaper coal energy due to the rise in oil and gas prices.
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