Jakarta. Indonesia has just secured a fresh grant worth 14.7 million euros or $15.3 million from France and the European Union (EU) for its energy transition, not long after the government’s endless complaints on the absence of international climate financing. 

The grant will go into backing the Indonesia Energy Transition Facility (IETF), a five-year technical assistance program set up by the French development agency AFD. The EU contributes about $10.6 million euros of the grant. About 4.1 million euros will come from the AFD. The IETF will assist the implementation of the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP), a separate $21.5 billion climate funding package dedicated for Indonesia’s shift from coal.

“The IETF has two components with the first part going to support [Indonesia’s] policymaking in the energy sector,” French Ambassador to Indonesia Fabien Penone told a press briefing in Jakarta on Wednesday.

The second component is a capacity building program meant for Indonesian state-owned energy enterprises, including Indonesia’s one and only electricity provider PLN. This program seeks to help the firms come up with “concrete” renewable energy projects such as hydro- and wind power generation. PLN is set to get about 6.5 million euros of the announced grant.

Penone said: “The IETF aligns with Indonesia’s ambitious energy transition objectives. So France is here to support the decisions taken by the Indonesian authorities.”

During Indonesia’s G20 presidency in 2022, Southeast Asia’s largest economy snagged the JETP package that started out with $20 billion in funding. About $10 billion came from the International Partners Group (IPG) which brings together a bunch of wealthy economies, including France and the EU. Japan and the US are the co-leads to the IPG, although Washington reportedly had decided to back out of its leadership role. France has pledged loans worth 500 million euros for the JETP. The remaining $10 billion is a financing pledge made by several financial institutions. The IPG later decided to increase the funding by $1.5 billion.

The JETP has been subject to massive backlash from the Indonesian government over the past few days. Energy Minister Bahlil Lahadalia recently said that Jakarta had received any international financing for its early coal plant retirement plans to date despite promises made by global donors. President Prabowo Subianto’s younger brother and climate envoy Hashim Djojohadikusumo even called the JETP “a failure”, saying that the US government had not disbursed a single dollar to Indonesia. The Jakarta Globe asked an EU diplomat whether the grant announcement was in response to these concerns.

“The preparatory work for the IETF already started a long time ago with the Indonesian government and PLN. … I hope [the IETF] addresses some concerns and that it shows that the JETP actually delivers,” Thibaut Portevin, head of cooperation for the EU Delegation to Indonesia, said later that day.

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