Oil, Gas, Mining Updates from Indonesia

7 Reports:

(Courtesy Joyo News Groups)

- Shell Wants To Be Senior Partner Of Pertamina In Natuna Gas
Block

- Indonesia's Pertamina: diesel oil stocks at 36 days

- Asia Crude-Pertamina seeks May-arrival sweet crude

- TABLE-Indonesia Feb Minas crude set at $44.70/bbl

- Jakarta May Be Able To Lower Gasoline Price To Rp4,000/Liter

- Work on $41m Bukit Asam Power Plant to Start in April

- PGN Increases Natural Gas Supply to PLN Power Plant

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Shell Wants To Be Senior Partner Of Pertamina In Natuna Gas Block

JAKARTA, March 6 Asia Pulse - Royal Dutch Shell said it wants to
become senior partner of state-oil and gas company Pertamina in
the multibillion dollar venture to develop Natuna D Alpha gas
block.

Shell should not be involved in the project as a junior partner
with a stake of not more than 15 per cent, Darwin Silalahi,
president and country chairman of PT Shell Indonesia said.

Silalahi said Shell wants a 30 per cent-60 per cent stake in
compensation for high level technology it will use in the
project, which will be transferred to Pertamina.

Shell receives such share split in its other deep sea oil and
gas projects in various other countries as do other
multinational companies, he said.

Pertamina Commissioner Maizar Rahman said the share split will
be decided after the company selects prospective partners
expected by the end of this month.

A number of other world class contractors including PetroChina
International, StatOil, Eni SpA have indicated interest in the
expensive venture estimated to cost US$50 billion.

Pertamina needs strategic partner to develop the reserve as it
will need large investment and high technology to process the
gas known to have high carbon dioxide content of 70 per cent.

Pertamina has said it was facing problem to continue the process
of selecting partners as apparently the project data are still
held by ExxonMobil Oil Indonesia, which earlier held the
contract but failed in implementation until the government
finally terminated it in 2005.

ExxonMobil protested the termination but the government has
handed over the project to Pertamina, reports said.

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Indonesia's Pertamina: diesel oil stocks at 36 days

JAKARTA, March 6 (Reuters) - Diesel oil stocks at Indonesia's
state oil and gas firm Pertamina remain high at 36 days on
slowing demand and the company plans to give discounts to
commercial domestic buyers, officials said on Friday.

A cooling of the economy due to the global financial crisis and
increasing use of alternative fuel has eroded demand in Asia's
top diesel importer.

"Diesel oil stocks are sufficient for 36 days. We plan to lower
them to 25 days," Pertamina's spokesman Anang Noor said, adding
that all Pertamina's refineries were running normally.

The company also planned to offer discounts to domestic
commercial diesel oil buyers in a bid to reduce stocks, another
official said.

"There are many domestic companies that do business in oil
products. We will give discounts to local buyers because we
still have plenty of stocks," Pertamina's corporate secretary,
Toharso, told reporters.

With fuel demand slowing, Indonesia has asked Kuwait to cut
second-quarter term supplies by nearly 80 percent, industry
sources said on Thursday. [ID:nSP452113]

The central bank has lowered Indonesia's 2009 economic growth
forecast to 4 percent from 4-5 percent, prompting it to reduce
interest rate by half a percentage point on Wednesday, and said
it has room for more cuts to support the economy by stoking
consumer demand.

(Reporting by Muklis Ali; Writing Fitri Wulandari; Editing by Ed
Davies)

---------------------------

Asia Crude-Pertamina seeks May-arrival sweet crude

TOKYO, March 6 (Reuters) - Indonesian state oil firm Pertamina
has issued its regular monthly tender for sweet crude, seeking
cargoes arriving in May, a trader said on Friday.

The tender closes on March 12, with bids to remain valid until
March 13.

Pertamina, one of the largest buyers of spot crude via tenders
on the Asia-Pacific market, bought a total of 3.1 million
barrels of April-arrival sweet crude last month.

The high spot purchases last month came on top of Pertamina's
move to raise term sweet crude imports for March to May to 1.55
million barrels a month, after skipping term purchases for
January and February. (Reporting by James Topham; Editing by
Chris Gallagher)

-----------------------------

TABLE-Indonesia Feb Minas crude set at $44.70/bbl

SINGAPORE, March 6 (Reuters) - Indonesia has set the official
Indonesia Crude Price (ICP) for Minas at $44.70 a barrel for
February, Pertamina Trading Energy, state oil company
Pertamina's trading arm said on its website. (www.pnatrade.com)

The February price was up 4 cents from January, when it was set
at $44.66.

The ICPs were in line with calculations published earlier this
week. [ID:nT75683]

The February ICPs for key grades are as follows, in dollars per
barrel:

CRUDE JANUARY FEBRUARY CHANGE

Minas 44.66 44.70 0.04

Ardjuna 41.99 43.12 1.13

Senipah Condensate 38.41 43.89 5.48

Attaka 43.72 44.38 0.66

Cinta 38.88 41.28 2.40

Duri 33.74 36.18 2.44

Widuri 39.55 40.76 1.21

Belida 43.18 43.81 0.63

Anoa 44.12 44.78 0.66

Arun 38.41 43.89 5.48

Badak/Bekapai 43.72 44.38 0.66

BRC 40.58 44.84 4.26

Bunyu 44.66 44.70 0.04

Handil Mix 42.14 43.27 1.13

Lalang 44.71 44.75 0.04

Walio 44.46 44.50 0.04

From July 2007, Indonesia Crude Price (ICP) formula uses average
prices assessed by Platts (50 percent) and Japan's Rim (50
percent). (Reporting by Judy Hua; Editing by Ramthan Hussain)

-------------------------------

Jakarta May Be Able To Lower Gasoline Price To Rp4,000/Liter

JAKARTA, March 6 Asia Pulse - The world crude price in 2009 is
predicted to remain around US$40 per barrel making it possible
for the Indonesian government to lower the domestic premium
gasoline price to Rp4,000 (US$0.33) per liter, an observer said.

"The crude price will remain at US$40 per barrel because the
world economic recession is expected to worsen and the world
economic slowdown will not trigger a drastic rise in demand for
oil that will drive up its price," Kurtubi, an oil industry
observer, said on the sidelines of a book launch here on
Thursday.

He said US President Obama's economic stimulus had not yet shown
any positive indications in terms of improvements in the US
economy which were expected to help improve the world economy.

"There is no signal so far yet. And I think if the stimulus is
implemented its impact will be felt only after 2010," he said.

For this purpose, he said, there is no reason for the government
not to lower the domestic price of premium gasoline to Rp4,000
per liter.

He said that with the rupiah exchange rate against the US dollar
at Rp11,000-Rp12,000, the premium price of Rp4,000 per liter was
a non-subsidized figure.

Kurtubi said that the lowering of the premium gasoline price to
Rp4,000 per liter would increase the people's purchasing power.

"The premium gasiline price cut will support the national
economy as it will increase the people's purchasing power and
boost domestic demand," he added.

------------------------------

The Jakarta Globe
Saturday, March 7, 2009

Work on $41m Bukit Asam Power Plant to Start in April

PT Tambang Batubara Bukit Asam, holder of a quarter of
Indonesia’s coal reserves, will start building a $41 million
power plant at its concession in South Sumatra Province next
month.

The coal-fired power plant, with a capacity of 30 megawatts,
will be completed in April 2011, Milawarma, operational director
at Bukit Asam, said on Friday. The company will use internal
cash to fund the project, he said.

Bukit Asam is seeking cheaper electricity after benchmark coal
prices in Asia dropped 66 percent from a record $194.79 a metric
ton in July. The company may save as much as $3.3 million a year
with the new plant, compared with the charges it’s currently
paying the state utility, Milawarma said.

Bloomberg

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The Jakarta Globe Saturday, March 7, 2009

PGN Increases Natural Gas Supply to PLN Power Plant

State natural gas supplier PT PGN said it increased supply to a
power plant run by state power utility PT PLN ahead of schedule.
PGN raised the gas supply to the Muara Tawar power plant to an
average of between 200 million cubic feet a day and 210 million
cubic feet a day, corporate secretary Wahid Sutopo said.

The company had expected to achieve that level in the second
quarter, Sutopo said on Friday. Gas supply may be added by
another 100 million cubic feet a day later this year, the
company said in a statement. PGN said on Dec. 23 that it
expected to boost sales this year by as much as 33 percent to an
average of between 700 million cubic feet a day and 800 million
cubic feet a day in 2009.

Bloomberg