Who Is Darmawan Prasodjo, The New President Director Of PLN, As Well As An Expert On Climate Change And New Renewable Energy?

Darmawan Prasodjo (left) when he received a mandate as PLN Director from the Minister of SOEs Erick Thohir (Photo: Antara Doc)

JAKARTA - Darmawan Prasodjo officially occupies the position of President Director of the State Electricity Company (PLN) replacing Zulkifli Zaini. The decision was conveyed by SOE Minister Erick Thohir earlier this week in accordance with the results of the General Meeting of Shareholders (GMS).

Executive Vice President of Communications at PLN Agung Murdifi said that the appointment of Darmawan was intended by Erick as a pioneer to make breakthroughs in accelerating the energy transition in Indonesia. The hope is that electricity costs can be more affordable while still paying attention to environmental issues which in the end will not burden the state and society.

"The government's hope is not without reason, because Darmawan Prasodjo, who previously served as Deputy President Director of PLN, is an energy and electricity expert who has decades of experience since his college days and continued into his professional career," said Agung in a press statement released today. Tuesday, December 7th.

It was stated that Darmawan took a Post Doctoral at the Nicholas Institute Duke University, United States in the field of energy and the environment with a focus on climate change, new and renewable energy (EBT), energy transition, and international climate agreement.

For his doctoral degree in applied economics with a focus on energy policy, energy modeling, and climate change at Texas A&M University, United States.

He also said that Darmawan's dissertation discussed comprehensively on the implementation of cap and trade policies, carbon trading, and the operation of Carbon Capture Storage technology in the power and utility sector of the US electricity industry.

“As an expert on climate change at the international level, Darmawan has complete capabilities and is able to act strategically as well as operationally. Strong in risk mapping both theory and practice, so that he can design and implement risk mitigation strategies and tactics that can be carried out by the company. Having an understanding and knowledge of investment and corporations, so that they can see the potential, opportunities, and design a vision for the future of the company, "explained Agung.

Meanwhile, Darmawan's experience was recorded in the presidential circle organization in the energy and infrastructure sector. Darmawan is very familiar with legal and regulatory aspects, the oil and gas and electricity contract system, macro-micro economy, as well as policy oversight and support.

"Darmawan is always able to find innovative solutions and carry out debottlenecking in various sectoral crises, as well as launch efforts to save the company's finances," he said.

It is hoped that, with Darmawan's long network and experience in government, the new PLN boss realizes how important it is to prepare a forward looking corporation by designing Carbon Neutral 2060 and the energy transition mechanism in achieving targets as well as strengthening national industrial capacity.

“Darmawan consolidates meeting points for solutions from various aspects, namely business, technical, and regulation and policy. One of them is in aligning long-term regulations on the EBT Law and the EBT Presidential Regulation," said Agung.

PLN business

Indeed, Darmawan Prasodjo is not new to the state stun company. He is known to have served as the company's commissioner for the 2018-2019 period. During this time, Darmawan is claimed to have succeeded in maintaining and supervising all on-the-track programs and maintaining the company's financial condition.

"During his duties as regulator, namely at the Presidential Staff Office serving as Deputy for Energy and Infrastructure (2015-2019), Darmawan managed to manage and carry out various debottlenecking of the Jokowi government's Priority Programs," continued Agung.

Furthermore, Darmawan became a strategic partner of PLN in overseeing the implementation of the 35 GW Program. It was revealed that he had successfully managed energy and infrastructure policies which were an important differentiator of the Jokowi administration from previous administrations.

Because of his expertise, he is said to have succeeded in unraveling various blockages in stalled projects, overseeing, and accelerating the progress of priority programs with strategic communication and multi-stakeholder consolidation from across ministries/agencies, to the regional level.

"Not only that, while serving as Deputy President Director of PLN (2019-2021), Darmawan has also successfully carried out his mandate as Chief Transformation Officer (CTO) whose job is to oversee PLN's transformation programs," concluded Agung.