JAKARTA, May 17 (Xinhua) -- Indonesia's oil and gas company Pertamina Inc. plans to buy 40,000 tons of liquefied petroleum gas(LPG) from U.S.-based ConocoPhilips with 32 million U.S. dollars to secure its May supply, which has been disrupted by a glitch at its Balongan refinery in West Java province, local media reported here on Saturday.

    Director for marketing and trading of the company Ahmad Faisal said the purchase was needed as current supply would only last for up to three days after a unit in the refinery last week went off-line, according to local newspaper the Jakarta Post.

    "The LPG will come from a ConocoPhilips plant in Teluk Semangka, Lampung, Indonesia" Faisal said.

    The Balongan refinery is the country's largest LPG producer, with an output of 1,200 tons of LPG per day, which is delivered to Jakarta and other cities on Java.

    Pertamina processing director Rukmini Hadihartini said the company needed 18 days to repair the equipment and get operations back to normal.

    Pertamina will also increase May gasoline imports by 1 million barrels as the commodity's consumption has risen 5 percent following a period of panic buying caused by the government's announcement to raise fuel prices.

    The government has capped the volume of subsidized fuels at 35.5 million kiloliters with a state budget allocation of 126.8 trillion rupiah (some 13.7 billion U.S. dollars), the Jakarta Postsaid.