Jakarta, CNN Indonesia —
Former Deputy Minister of SOEs Arcandra Tahar uncover a number of reasons for the price coal and natural gas jumped sharply. This increase has caused the energy crisis in Europe to China in the last month.
“The hope that the Covid-19 pandemic will be controlled in 2021 has raised the optimism of economic actors to start investing and doing activities. This has resulted in higher energy needs,” Arcandra said in a post on Instagram, Tuesday (5/10).
However, the increasing demand for energy cannot be matched by renewable energy which only Europe has 26 percent.
He also explained that many wind turbines have stopped operating due to being in the maintenance phase. This makes business people look for alternative energy that is able to run their business quickly.
Finally, coal was chosen as an energy source on the grounds that it is cheap and not difficult to operate. This condition is further exacerbated by the China-Australia trade war which has hampered coal supply.
So that the price of coal commodities rose sharply to US $ 189 per ton. It didn’t stop there, natural gas was also hoisted up to US$20 per MMBTU. This is due to the high demand for electricity and the high price of coal to generate electricity.
He revealed that natural gas is also used by Europeans to heat the room during autumn to winter.
Since fossil energy investment has been limited, gas production from offshore fields has been decreasing. In addition, the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project between Russia and Germany has not yet been completed.
Finally, Europe was forced to import liquefied natural gas (LNG) at high prices. With the prices of coal and natural gas rising sharply, businesses and households are increasingly choking on access to electricity.
Arcandra also gave input so that decisions related to fossil energy and renewable energy must be carried out with the right strategy, not emotionally.
He assessed that several steps were being taken by Europe to overcome this crisis. These include returning electricity company profits to consumers, reducing 90 percent of VAT, limiting gas prices, increasing the subsidy budget, and reallocating renewable energy budgets to tax reductions.
(fry/age)
– .
