Sunstar Davao
ABOITIZ Power Corporation (APC) plans to put up US$400 million worth of investments in Davao City by 2014.
Erramon Aboitiz, president and chief executive officer of Aboitiz Group, together with Jaime Aboitiz, executive vice president and chief operating officer of APC, and several other top officials of the power firm, presented his proposal to the media last Tuesday on the planned coal-fueled power plant in the city.
The proposed Circulating Fluidized-Bed Coal Power project, which will be the largest investment in the history of Davao, aims to address the persistent increase of power demand in Mindanao and Davao Region, in particular, amid a decreasing supply.
"In the face of the fast deteriorating power supply situation n Mindanao, it is imperative that stakeholders on power of Mindanao take urgent and decisive steps to attain self-sufficiency and security in their power supply," Aboitiz said.
He, however, said that they still have no specific prospective sites as they are still evaluating on where to put up the power plant.
Aboitiz said from 2010-2014, they projected that the shortfall of the supply and demand of power in Mindanao will reach 484 megawatts.
"This shortfall is staggering as, based on present demand, this is equivalent to depriving power supply completely to five major Cities in Mindanao including Davao," he said.
If this shortfall continues to prevail, this will mean rotating brownouts in entire Mindanao for up to three hours of during rainy seasons and up to six hours during dry season, he added.
"Aboitiz believes that available, reliable, and affordable power is the life blood of our country, fueling our economy and individual opportunity," he said.
Despite the image that the coal-fired power plant had created for the past decades, Aboitiz said the proposed coal power plant is far different from the coal plants in the past 50 years now.
"It is cleaner, greener and they have created measures to minimize the impact of the proposed plant to the environment," he said.
"I am optimistic that Mayor Sara will support or proposal because her main concern was the effects of the power plant of the environment," he added. (JOP)
Published in the Sun.Star Davao newspaper on October 07, 2010.
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