Thursday, April 28, 2011

Alcantaras to build 2 coal-fired plants

By Amy R. Remo
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 21:50:00 04/28/2011


MANILA, Philippines—Conal Holdings Corp., led by the Alcantaras’ Alsons Consolidated Resources Inc., is pushing through with a plan to build two coal-fired power plants in Sarangani and Zamboanga to provide 300 megawatts in additional baseload capacity to these areas in four to five years.
Antonio Miguel B. Alcantara, financial analyst for Alsons, said the additional capacity would be crucial as two of its build-own-and-operate (BOO) contracts would expire in 2015 and 2016.
Alcantara was referring to the contracts for the 100-MW diesel facility of Western Mindanao Power Corp. (WMPC) and the 55-MW bunker fired power station of Southern Philippines Power Corp. (SPPC).
State-run National Power Corp. serves as the buyer of the electricity generated from these two facilities. Once the contracts expire, the diesel facilities are expected to become merchant plants that could provide ancillary services to the Mindanao grid.
“These coal plants will replace the capacities of the diesel (plants),” Alcantara said.
Investments for the two coal-fired facilities may reach $700 million, of which $450 million would be the cost of the Sarangani facility.
Alcantara did not disclose investment figures for the Zamboanga coal plant but he noted that the group might invest $2 million to $2.5 million to produce a megawatt of coal power. This meant that for the 100-MW Zamboanga plant, Conal Holdings may have to spend as much as $250 million.

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