Bekasi Goes Green

Bahasa (Indonesian)

World Bank - Bekasi, March 3, 2008 – If there is any city in the island of Java that deserves to be recognized for its progressive, green-minded approach to sustainable development, that city would be Bekasi. A city of two million people just east of the capital, Bekasi has become the first city in Java Island to enter into an emission reduction purchase agreement that promises both environmental and social benefits.

The agreement entails the set-up of a gas-flaring facility at Bekasi’s Sumur Batu landfill, which generates up to seven hundred cubic meters of solid waste each year. The flaring technique essentially traps the methane gas resulting from solid waste, and goes a long way in reducing the number of climate pollutants deriving from Bekasi. Methane is a greenhouse gas that is potentially 21 times more harmful than CO2, the main contributor to global warming. The flaring facility will be built by PT Gikoko Kogyo Indonesia, an engineering company that specializes in clean air technology, and is scheduled to be operational by the end of March.

The World Bank, acting as a trustee of the Netherlands Clean Development Mechanism, will help provide the social benefit component. Under the agreement for Bekasi city, the World Bank will purchase 250,000 tons of CO2-equivalent of Certified Emissions Reductions (CER) each year, for the next 15 years. In the global carbon market, one CER is equal to one ton of CO2 and is priced between US$5 to $10. From the deal signed between the World Bank and PT Gikoko, seventeen percent of the revenues generated would towards developing Bekasi.

“Seven percent of the revenues will support community development in Sumur Batu,” said Bekasi city secretary Tjandra Utama Effendi in a press conference after the signing ceremony. “Another 10 percent of the revenue will be added to the local budget.”

The Bekasi gas flaring project is only the second of its kind in Indonesia. Last year, the World Bank facilitated a similar agreement to a landfill in Pontianak, West Kalimantan. Another such project is currently being prepared in Makassar, South Sulawesi.