2024-07-11 00:00:00 | Ombudsman to investigate World Bank's ties to Java 9 & 10 project

The internal inquiry will address allegations that the World Bank Group’s private lending arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), is contributing to immense harm through its back door support for the expansion of Southeast Asia’s largest and dirtiest coal-fired power station.

2023-09-25 00:00:00 | Report reveals over 1500 deaths a year and up to $1bn in costs of Suralaya complex

A report released by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) has revealed the massive health and economic burden of the Suralaya coal complex, of which proposed units Java 9 & 10 are a part. The research centre estimates that about 1500 deaths a year are attributable to the coal-fired power complex, in a month when Jakarta has the worst air pollution on the planet. The paper also describes the economic burden of the coal industry in Suralaya. Through the impacts on work absence, prenatal and neonatal illnesses, long-term disability and respiratory illness-related hospital visits, the authors estimate an economic cost of the coal industry approximating USD $1bn. They also debunk Indonesian government rhetoric downplaying the impact of the coal industry on Jakarta's air pollution.

2023-09-14 00:00:00 | Civil society lodges formal complaint against the IFC for its indirect support of Java 9 & 10

A formal complaint was lodged in September 2023 by our partners Trend Asia, PENA Masyarakat, Inclusive Development International (IDI) and Recourse against the World Bank's private sector lending arm, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), for its involvement in Java 9 & 10. The complaint was motivated by local communities' staunch opposition to the proposed coal plant units. Communities say the plants are unnecessary and that the impacts will be catastrophic for local people and the climate. Thousands of premature deaths and more than 250 million metric tons of CO2 are estimated to result from the coal-fired power plant. The IFC is indirectly involved in the coal plants, which are currently under construction, through Hana Bank Indonesia, a financial intermediary. The IFC's intermediaries are banks that have been financed by the IFC through debt and equity investments and which then go on to provide finance to projects and companies. Recourse says that the World Bank's IFC has since closed loopholes in its policies that allowed the indirect financing of Java 9 & 10 through Hana Bank, but that the IFC still has a long way to go to ensure that its clients do not use IFC funds (originally, taxpayers' contributions via member states of the World Bank) to finance climate-damaging projects around the world.

2023-03-30 00:00:00 | Brief history

The Banten Suralaya Power Station is a coal fired power plant owned by Perusahaan Listrik Negara (PLN) in the Indonesian island of Jawa, consisting of eight power generating units. The facility receives coal from the Suralaya Coal Terminal, which is provided by Bukit Asam Coal Mining operations in Sumatra. In 2016, plans for an expansion of the plant were released by PT PLN, in the form of two new power generating units. 

Construction of units 9 & 10 was supposed to commence in December 2017 but was delayed. In September 2018, it was reported that Dosan Heavy Industries and Construction along with Indo Raya Tenaga would begin the construction of units 9 & 10 in early 2019. In June 2020, KEPCO invested $51m USD to secure a 15% stake in the Jawa 9 & 10 project from Barito Pacific. 

In 2019, PT PLN released a long-term plan, in which it stated that construction would start in the beginning of 2020. It lists 2023 and 2024 as the completion deadlines for Jawa 9 and 10 respectively. Construction was further delayed as the project only achieved financial close in late 2020. 

In August 2020, WALHI filed a lawsuit to compel the governor of Banten Province to revoke the environmental permit for the expansion issued in 2017, which was based on the project’s Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). WALHI argued that the public consultation as part of the EIA was inadequate and that the impact assessment of decreased air quality and public health problems of Jawa 9 & 10 was based on incomplete, outdated and invalid information. The lawsuit was withdrawn in February 2021 because a new environmental permit was issued in 2018 that WALHI was unable to access. Public access to Jawa 9 and 10’s environmental permit has been very limited and until the filing of the lawsuit, there was little transparency around the project’s environmental and social due diligence. Only during the court case, WALHI was made aware that there was an updated environmental permit.