Indonesia post-oil

In one of his posts, Indonesia an oil-rich country?, Philips, interestingly started the post with his opinion on Playboy Indonesia magazine, cited an interview from Warta Ekonomi about Indonesia's oil reserve - that it will last only for the next 20-25 years.

Even now Indonesia is already a net importer of oil. How will it be 25 years from now? Importing 100% oil requirements? How will it pay?

Is the government aware of this?

But there's a potential solution. Water. More specifically, from the rain.

Indonesia is among the countries that will get more rainfall due to global warming; while other regions will have their rivers, lakes and aquifers depleted. As water availability is very likely to increase, it could be the new oil for Indonesia. Perhaps 25 years from now we can trade water for oil.

Of course, selling water from rainfalls is not straightforward. For the time being, some people have tried this in smaller scale. But if there is a good business case, or a case for survival, it's worthwhile for the government to explore and develop.

So it seems that water could be the 'gold' of the future - especially with rich countries also face the problems of water stress. Even now some people are selling water with premium, like what Jakartass found (scroll down to March 4).

Anyhow, it's still 25 years from now. The government perhaps should think about how to manage the potential flood from the increasing rainfall.

We don't want to end up with no oil and flood, do we?

What's sad is that one major cause of global warming is us burning the fossil fuel - coal, gas, and oil.