The speed at which mankind has used the Earth’s resources over the past 20 years has put “humanity’s very survival” at risk, a study involving 1,400 scientists has concluded.

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… each person in the world now requires a third more land to supply his or her needs than the Earth can supply.

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Thirty per cent of amphibians, 23 per cent of mammals and 12 per cent of birds are under threat of extinction, while one in ten of the world’s major rivers runs dry every year before it reaches the sea.

Cited from Timesonline

Purnomo mengatakan, secara bertahap harga jual panas bumi (geotermal) akan mencapai 5 dollar AS per kWh dalam kurun 30 tahun kontrak pembangkit listrik. Pada kurun 10 tahun pertama produksi, harga jual geotermal kemungkinan masih di atas 5 sen dollar AS per kWh guna pengembalian investasi, namun secara bertahap akan turun menjadi 5 sen dollar per kWh.
(dikutip dari Kompas, 24 Oktober 2007)

“Harga listrik dari sumber energi panas bumi 6 sen dollar AS per kilowatt jam, dari sumber energi batu bara 3 sen dollar AS. Produksi listrik dari panas bumi tidak mendapat subsidi, sedangkan dari batu bara mendapat subsidi,” kata Direktur Pusat Teknologi Konversi dan Konservasi Energi Badan Pengkajian dan Penerapan Teknologi (BPPT) Arya Rezavidi, Kamis (11/10).
(dikutip dari Kompas, 12 Oktober 2007)

The third report from an international group of scientists on the effects of climate change focuses on how to reduce carbon emissions and minimise their effects. The article provide a guide to the key areas where the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) believes the reductions can be achieved.

Full text article at BBC News

Global temperatures predicted for the coming centuries could trigger a mass extinction, UK scientists have warned. The temperatures are within the range of greenhouse phases early in the Earth’s history when up to 95% of plants and animals died out, they say.

Full text article at BBC News

Similar articles:

• Extinctions Linked to Hotter Temperatures [FOX News]
• Climate change ‘extinctions’ warning [Guardian Unlimited]

“Carbon dioxide is rising at a much faster rate than before,” says study co-author Christopher Field, director of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Global Ecology in California. “In the 1990s, CO2 emissions increased by about 1.3% per year. Since 2000, the growth rate has been 3.3% per year.” The researchers calculate that global carbon-dioxide emissions were 35% higher in 2006 than in 1990.

Canadell says that while the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts “we will have temperature increases of 3.2 to 7.1 degrees by the end of the century, … we’re well on the way to the higher temperature increase if the emissions keep going up at this rate.”

Full text article at USAToday.com

Japanese businessmen grouped in Nippon Keidanren (Kadin`s Japanese counterpart) have started to wonder about Indonesia`s gas supply policy after the Indonesian government prioritized the meeting its domestic needs, rather than exports to Japan. Chairman of Nippon Keidanren Fuji Mitarai told chairman of the Regional Representatives Council DPD) Ginandjar Kartasasmita about this development …

“Keidanren has indeed questioned the matter, but we have already explained them that Indonesia has no problem in gas supplies to Japan under the agreed contract. Indonesia respects the contract with Japan,” the former mines and energy minister said. Now the problem is, said the honorable lecturer at Waseda University in Tokyo, the new contract which has yet to be renewed. “It is in this context that the government has invited Japan to actively assist Indonesia explorations and development of other alternative resources,” said Ginandjar.

Indonesia and Japan are currently engaged in bargaining in the energy sector. And Vice President Jusuf Kalla when on a visit to Tokyo by the end of May this year, have also touched on this sector.

Japan as an industrialized country consumed a great deal of energy, and therefore needs regular and stable gas supplies from its suppliers like Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei. Japan`s gas consumption in 2004 reached more than 70.3 million metric tons, 68 percent of which had been imported.

Source: Antara

It is just another sign that Japanese Government has started to influence Indonesian energy policy to fulfill their own interest. Attracting Japanese investors to invest in energy exploration sector in order to increase energy export is clearly not a fair solution. Instead, Indonesian government must urge its counterpart to relocate some of their energy intensive industries to Indonesia.

Related news:

• Indonesia planning to cut gas exports to Japan [Forbes]

Pemerintah pun bertekad segera melakukan perbaikan hutan. Pemerintah menargetkan akan menanam 1,6 miliar pohon yang akan ditanam di 900 ribu hektar lahan. Langkah awal yang akan dilakukan Pemerintah adalah melakukan penanaman pohon secara bersama-sama dengan jumlah 79 ribu pohon yang akan digelar serentak di Indonesia pada 27 November 2007 mendatang. “Target kita menanam 2 miliar pohon dan pada tahun 2007 ini kita targetkan 1,6 miliar pohon ini diluar program penanaman 79 ribu pohon,” kata MS Kaban.

Gerakan ini merupakan rangkaian dari Konferensi Perubahan Iklim, 3-14 Desember 2007 di Bali oleh Persatuan Bangsa-Bangsa (PBB). Konferensi yang diikuti 15 ribu peserta tersebut, berkaitan dengan perubahan iklim dan pemanasan global akibat banyaknya gas emisi yang terbuang.Menurut MS Kaban, saat ini Indonesia menduduki peringkat ketiga di dunia sebagai negara penghasil emisi. Namun tidak seperti negara lain emisi dihasilkan dari industri, Indonesia dari kebakaran hutan. “Kita tidak ingin itu terjadi. Kita tidak ingin kita dianggap sebagai negara penghasil emisi. Padahal kita mempunyai hutan konservasi yang relatif baik,” ujarnya.Sumber: Detik.com

Program yang perlu mendapat dukungan, dengan syarat, ini bukan sekedar program sesaat apalagi hanya sekedar untuk mengail popularitas. Jangan juga dilupakan illegal logging dan kebakaran hutan masih menjadi permasalahan penting sektor kehutanan di Indonesia.

Ironisnya di sisi yang lain program biodisel berbasis kelapa sawit yang dicanangkan pemerintah justeru mengancam kelestarian hutan. Ini hanyalah salah satu bukti masih carut-marutnya kebijakan pembangunan di negeri kita.

Perusahaan asal Islandia, Reykjavik Energy Invest, siap untuk menggarap potensi panas bumi di Indonesia dengan kapasitas sebesar 500 MW dalam waktu dekat. Wilayah kerja panas bumi itu akan dikembangkan lagi.

Menteri Industri dan Energi Islandia Ossom Skarphedinsson memperkirakan dana yang dibutuhkan untuk mengembangkan 1 MW panas bumi mencapai US$ 3-4 juta. Hal yang sama diakui Dirut Pertamina Geothermal Energy Bambang Kustono. “Perhitungan kita juga sama sekitar segitu,” katanya.

Direktur Operasi Pertamina Geothermal Energy, Suryadarma menambahkan, untuk menyiasati harga listrik yang di Indonesia, Reykjavik kemungkinan akan membangun pabrik aluminium di Indonesia. “Jadi pabrik dia itu yang akan beli listrik yang dia hasilkan sendiri. Baru hasil pabrik aluminiumnya diekspor ke Islandia atau negara pasarnya. Dengan begitu dia bisa lebih untung,” katanya.

Dikutip dari sumber: Detikfinance

Berita serupa bisa dibaca di:

Indonesia-Islandia Akan Bangun Pembangkit Listrik Panas Bumi [Tempo Interaktif]

Ini adalah pola investasi yang menarik. Indonesia bisa lebih memainkan peran strategis dengan mengembangkan industri berbasis sumber daya alam domestik. Selama ini strategi ekspor sumber daya alam energi tidak mampu menciptakan kemandirian bangsa.

Resource-poor Japan is the world’s largest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and Indonesia is its number one supplier, as well as the second-biggest provider of coal to Tokyo and sixth for crude oil.

An Indonesian official said last month that Jakarta hoped to boost its non-oil and gas exports to Japan to $20 billion in 2010, up from $11 billion in 2006. Indonesia imported about $8.65 billion of goods from Japan in 2005, Japanese government data showed.

Cited from Reuters

Pemerintah akan melelang lima wilayah kerja panas bumi dua bulan mendatang. Dirjen Mineral Batu bara dan Panas Bumi Departemen Energi dan Sumber Daya Mineral, Simon Sembiring mengatakan lima wilayah kerja itu adalah Seulawah Agam, Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam (160 MW), Jailolo, Halmahera, Maluku Utara (75 MW), Telaga Ngebel, Ponorogo, Jatim (120 MW), Gunung Ungaran, Jateng (50 MW), Gunung Tampomas, Jabar (50 MW).

Sumber Tempo Interaktif