The Mempawah, West Kalimantan Smelter Grade Alumina Refinery (SGAR) project owned by PT Inalum and PT Aneka Tambang Tbk (Antam) is projected to experience a delayed operation schedule. The project with a capacity of 1 million tons was originally targeted for completion in July 2023. The calculation dispute between the project contractor's EPC makes the project implementation not run optimally. Just so you know, the SGAR Project is managed by PT Borneo Alumina Indonesia (PT BAI) which is owned by PT Inalum (Persero) with 60% shares and ANTAM with 40% shares.

President Director of PT BAI Dante Sinaga said, referring to the existing plan, the project should have reached 71.73%. Unfortunately, until now, the project with an investment of US$ 831.5 million has only reached 13.78%.

"This is mainly due to the very late progress of procurement . Procurement is 47.75% late," said Dante in an RDP with Commission VII DPR RI, Monday (21/3).

Dante said that the delay in procurement work had an impact on other stages. In addition, there are two main factors that have also contributed to the delay in the Mempawah SGAR project. Dante said that there were still disputes between EPC contractors. The absence of an agreement reached for the internal consortium agreement is recognized as an obstacle.

Meanwhile, the EPC contractor for this project is a state-owned company from China, China Aluminum International Engineering Corporation Ltd (Chalieco) together with PT Pembangunan Perumahan Tbk (PTPP). The second factor is related to the work and location for red mud for the B3 waste treatment plant from the smelter. "So these two things (causes) but the biggest one is the dispute between the consortium," said Dante. Dante also confirmed that mediation efforts have been carried out but so far no agreement has been reached.

PTPP EPC Operations Director Eddy Herman Harun revealed that there was still a difference in the calculation of values ​​for several works between PTPP and Chalieco. Eddy explained, based on the scope of work, PTPP was in charge of civil work and the rest by Chalieco.

"We can't work alone because the data has to come from Chalieco. We can't make it up, it's too late to reach us and we haven't even provided all of the data facilities to us," said Eddy. Eddy continued, based on the consortium contract, the unit price has been agreed for the construction covering 2,628 items . Of these, 2,297 items are unit ptices and the rest are lump sum items .

For item prices , the initial contract value reached Rp 2.77 trillion. Later there was a difference in calculations for the work and prices between the two consortium members. This delay is recognized as having the potential to make the project have to be pushed back from the schedule.

"If the T&C is like this, the project will definitely be pushed back, if it's finished it will be finished, but it's time for it to be postponed," said Dante, unfortunately he couldn't provide further projections. For your information, this project is expected to be able to process bauxite from PT Antam for further delivery to the Inalum Smelter. The presence of this project is also expected to reduce the number of alumina imports.

Source: https://industri.kontan.co.id/news/epc-kontraktor-tidak-akur-smelter-alumina-inalum-antam-terhambat