This joint project between the University of Southern California(USC) and Institute Technology Bandung (ITB), with input from Star Energy, addresses one of the challenges to support the development of geothermal energy source in Indonesia: The high demand for geothermal engineers and earth scientists. The education capacity building of this project will help increase the geothermal program graduates of ITB to 50 in 5 years. This should satisfy the personnel requirements for the operation and maintenance of about 5,000 MW by the year 2015. ITB educational capacity building should also help meet personnel demands for exploration.
The project is also intended to provide opportunities for USC to further develop and expand its geothermal education programs through a partnership in one of the most resource rich geothermal areas of the world. The involvement and support of Star Energy will provide direct industry input into education initiatives and is intended to lead to greater involvement and coordination between academia and industry in the Indonesian geothermal business.
The key element of these collaborative efforts is to build on the experience base of both ITB and USC on geothermal related education and R&D. In addition, we expect to benefit from operational experience of Star Energy to make such educational activities more relevant to the real life challenges and requirements of geothermal operators.
The participating universities of USC and ITB, with guidance from the advisory board, will develop a two year program to facilitate collaboration and jointly develop and enhance both Universities’ geothermal energy related research and education activities. These will involve specific activities which will lead to both near term and longer term development of Indonesia’s higher education programs in geothermal energy. Some of the key major tasks are:
- Develop of a geothermal education capacity expansion roadmap through collaboration between USC and ITB. The roadmap will be a clear set of action steps to guide ITB and USC to be among the leading global geothermal energy educational institutions.
- Set aside reasonable number of student grants for Masters and PhD Students to be enrolled at ITB and USC, as well as the necessary funding for professors involved to supervise them.
- Conduct field trips for students and faculty to provide opportunities to gain real world geothermal exploration, steam production and power plant operation experience by working with Star Energy or other industry partners.
- Offer “Distance Learning Courses” to USC and ITB students in virtual class rooms taught by both USC and ITB faculty
- Conduct monthly seminars on Geothermal energy hosted alternatively by ITB and USC with video conferencing capability to allow students and faculty from both universities to take part.
- Encourage participation of ITB and USC students and faculty in geothermal related conferences,
- Develop short courses and workshops with on important topics (ITB & USC and Star Energy)
- Establish a technical program exchange between ITB and USC to begin collaboration. This program will consist of at least one activity in Indonesia and one activity in the United States. Activities may include:
In addition, this program will lead to many other future opportunities to collaborate on geothermal research between ITB and USC.