What position should Indonesia have in placing its renewable energy development and energy transition plan?

Indonesia’s energy sector may face a situation of giddiness in deciding its transition towards a much larger use of renewable energy than is currently being exploited. The sector might be caught between the large hope to play larger role in mitigating climate change (through reducing emissions) contrary with the fact that its development of renewable energy is still weak.History has recorded that Indonesia is one of the world’s leading exporters of fossil fuels, a unique position compared to some other countries in Asia that are large-scale energy importers, such as Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. With the wealth of fossil fuels (oil, natural gas, coal) in the archipelago, then it is natural that Indonesia’s energy consumption is dominated by fossil fuels. However, with Indonesia’s role as a sizeable energy producer and its growing for both energy consumption and green-house gases (GHG) emission, it makes sense that the country’s participation in mitigating world climate change is highly desirable. Moreover, there are extensive forests in the tropical Indonesia which are expected to be maintained, because of its role as “sink” and as the lungs of the world.The world’s attention to the issue of climate change has progressedquickly, not only from being concerned about carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions due to the burning of fossil fuels, but it has reached an agreement to maintain the earth’s temperature as stated lately by the Paris Agreement (2015).This paper highlights the development of Indonesia’s energy policies, particularly on renewable energy and environmental ones relating to global climate change and energy transition. After describing international agreements on global climate change and analyzing Indonesia’s renewable energy performances versus their development targets, this paper suggests fundamental steps for the country’s renewable energy development to facilitate the achievement of targets for increasing the share of renewable energy as well as achieving the targets of the energy transition program. The paper is composed as follows. It starts by describing development of international agreement on global climate change, paying emphasize on Indonesia’s participation on the issue (Section2). The next sectionis about development of Indonesia’s energy policy, particularly that on renewable energy and related energy-environment one. Then, Section4 follows with common debates on Indonesia’s energy-environment issues. Section5 reminds about foundation for the success of renewable energy development, followed by Section6 showing about energy transition and the necessary works to meet the Paris Agreement. Section 7 summarizes and presents recommendations of the paper.

source :

https://workingpapers.bappenas.go.id/index.php/bwp/article/view/100