Dwi Susilaningsih Head of Infrastructure Research CenterBiotech Division, Indonesian Institute of Sciences
Renewable energy technology must reach the people

Indonesia is a vast archipelago with bountiful resources. This is the reason why Dwi Susilaningsih has spent more than 20 years researching marine microbes that can potentially be converted into energy. She lamented, however, that Indonesians were slow to take advantage of such sources as the sun, wind or sea currents as renewable energy sources. As of today, only five percent of the total energy produced in Indonesia is renewable.

"And those renewable energy sources are small scale," said Dwi, head of the Infrastructure Research Center at the Biotech Division of the Indonesian Institute of Science (LIPI). Not surprisingly, she hopes the government will put more effort into producing energy from renewable resources, instead of from fossil fuels. This would be in line with the commitment made by more than 180 countries, including Indonesia, to reduce global emission after the UNFCCC-COP21 in Paris last year.

March 8, 2016