he war-driven oil price shock has exposed Indonesia’s dependence on imported fuel and strengthens the case for electrifying transportation, but experts say a plan to convert millions of gasoline motorcycles to electric may be the wrong tool for the job.
The government is reviving a program to retrofit existing motorcycles with electric engines as it seeks to curb fuel consumption and reduce energy subsidies at a time when global oil markets are rattled by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz amid the United States-Israel war on Iran.
In early March, President Prabowo Subianto appointed Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Bahlil Lahadalia to head an energy transition task force tasked with converting up to 120 million motorcycles within three to four years and generating an additional 100 gigawatts of solar power.
Bahlil said last week that the government would provide “sweeteners”, adding that the state would shoulder part of the cost when owners convert their two-wheelers to electric ones.
Read also: Fuel price hike in the cards if budget ‘can’t bear’ oil subsidy
Electrification is the right policy direction for reducing fuel consumption, but encouraging consumers to buy new electric motorcycles would likely yield faster results than converting existing ones, given that the program clashed with economic realities, said Yannes Pasaribu, an automotive industry expert at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB).
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“Policies [that encourage] buying a new electric motorcycle make more sense for consumers ready for EVs. This aligns with the fact that the conversion program delivered very limited results [in the past],” Yannes told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
