Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Opens Opportunity to Stop Importing Gasoline Next Year

JAKARTA - Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) Bahlil Lahadalia opened the opportunity to stop importing gasoline with octane levels of RON 92, RON 95, and RON 98 in 2027 if domestic production capacity is sufficient to meet domestic needs.

"If all of these (RON 92, RON 95, and RON 98) products are already available, it means that we no longer need to import," said Bahlil as reported by ANTARA, Wednesday, January 14.

Bahlil is trying to increase the production capacity of Indonesian refineries for the three types of fuel oil (BBM) in order to meet domestic needs.

He targeted that the addition of the production of RON 92, RON 95, and RON 98 could be realized in 2027.

"Our imports (Indonesia) of RON 92, RON 95, and RON 98, we want to encourage that the production must already be in 2027, possibly in the second semester," he said.

If Indonesia can produce these three types of fuels itself, he said, then the import tap of fuel will be stopped.

Private fuel filling station (SPBU) management business entities such as Shell, bp, and Vivo will buy fuel from Pertamina.

"So, please buy from Pertamina. However, as long as our production capacity is still less than consumption, we still have to import temporarily," said Bahlil.

For now, Bahlil said that private gas stations are still given quotas to import fuel.

However, Bahlil still takes into account the range of numbers for each private gas station.

The provision of import quotas is due to the production capacity at Pertamina which has not been sufficient to meet existing demand.

"For the private sector, we still give the import quota, but we are calculating the range," said Bahlil.

Bahlil accompanied President Prabowo Subianto in inaugurating the Balikpapan Refinery revitalization project or Balikpapan Refinery Development Master Plan (RDMP), Balikpapan Refinery, East Kalimantan, Monday, January 12, 2026.

The project can cut gasoline imports by 5.8 million kiloliters (KL) per year.

Bahlil said that national needs reached around 38.5 million KL per year, while domestic production was around 14.27 million KL.

The needs consist of RON 90 gasoline of 28.9 million KL per year, RON 92 of 8.7 million KL per year, and RON 95 and RON 98 of around 650 thousand KL per year.

Through the optimization of the Balikpapan Refinery RDMP, Bahlil hopes that gasoline production with an octane value above RON 90 can be increased to 5.8 million KL per year.