Pertamina Spends US$600mn for Lightning Rods to Avert Fire at Oil Refineries

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - President Director of Pertamina, Nicke Widyawati, stated that the state-owned gas and oil firm had taken several measures to prevent the risk of fire at oil refineries. One of them is by building a lightning protection system at all its refineries.

“For this (lightning protection system), we have spent around US$600 million to build two-layer resilience,” Nicke said during a hearing with Commission VII of the House of Representatives (DPR) on Tuesday, April 4. If the figure is converted into rupiah, the spending reaches Rp8.9 trillion with an assumed exchange rate of Rp14,958 per US dollar.

Based on the audit after the fire incident at the Balongan Oil Refinery, Indramayu, back in 2021, Nicke explained, lightning was one of the causes. “We have installed two layers of lightning protection, both in the equipment and in the tower. It's done,” she added.

She claimed that it was a successful effort given that the Cilacap oil refinery was safe albeit there were 17 lightning occurred on December 5, 2022. This means what Pertamina has built could avert fires like at the Balongan oil refinery.

“We will keep learning from existing cases, from other players. We will proceed with this effort because we all know that the refineries we are operating are old,” Nicke said.

The most recent fire incident at Pertamina’s oil refinery occurred on Saturday night last week, April 1. The oil refinery in Dumai, Riau, caught fire at 10:40 p.m. which was followed by an explosion heard from more than 25 kilometers away. 

Prior to the fire, it was reported that there was a loud bang coming from the oil refinery. Many residents reported that the sound even shook furniture and was heard until Rampat Island. The fire killed nine workers.

MOH KHORY ALFARIZI | ANTARA

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