PLN digitizes power plants to bolster operational activities

id PLN,PLTS,PLTB,Darmawan Prasodjo ,rtificial intelligence,power plant,renewable energy,REOC,i-CORE

PLN digitizes power plants to bolster operational activities

Illustration--Workers install an electricity transmission line. So far, PLN has digitized the power plants owned by its subsidiaries, PT Indonesia Power (IP) and PT Pembangkitan Jawa-Bali (ANTARA/HO-PT PLN/uyu)

Jakarta (ANTARA) - State-owned electricity provider PT PLN (Persero) has continued to implement its program to digitize power plants through the application of artificial intelligence technology by installing five thousand connection sensors to support the company's operational activities.

Almost all of the corporation’s power plants have implemented digitization, thus they can be controlled through gadgets, President Director of PLN Darmawan Prasodjo said while launching the PLN Elevation program.

The application of the artificial intelligence technology is meant to help handle the large-scale intermittent production of electric current due to the utilization of renewable energy, such as in solar power plants (PLTS) and wind power plants (PLTB), since the amount of electricity generated by the power plants would strongly depend on nature and weather conditions.

“Thus, (electric current) fluctuations, which used to (only) occur on the demand side, are now also happening on the supply side," he noted.

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Hence, when the weather condition is not good, PLN has to increase the operation of baseload power plants and reduce the operation of PLTS and PLTB. Prasodjo informed that currently, PLN is modernizing and digitizing the control room, in addition to the power plants, so that it can shift the operation of the power plants quickly.

So far, the enterprise has digitized the power plants owned by its subsidiaries, PT Indonesia Power (IP) and PT Pembangkitan Jawa-Bali (PJB). Each of them has introduced a digital system for power plant management: PT IP is using the Intelligence Center of Optimization Reliability and Efficiency (i-CORE) and PT PJB is using the Reliability Efficiency Optimization Center (REOC).

Furthermore, Prasodjo said that digitization has not only been carried out in the power plant management system, but also in the electricity transmission and distribution system and the project bidding system. "We have digitized every aspect since we estimate that there will be an extraordinary change due to the utilization of a very large amount of renewable energy," he added.