Renewable energy

Manila Bulletin

By Fr. EMETERIO BARCELON, SJ

June 24, 2011, 3:02am

MANILA, Philippines — FIT (Feed in Tariff) is the schedule of allowances that serve as incentives for renewable energy (RE) proposals. Difficulties for electricity generation are pollution and the increasing cost of petroleum fuel.

Many of our neighbors use FIT to promote RE electricity generation. It was developed in Germany but as the experts, who are meeting this week at the Asian Development Bank, each country will have to tailor it to its own circumstances and opportunities.

Commissioner Tan of the Phil. Electricity Regulatory Board (ERB) expects that the FIT schedule of prices should be decided on by the ERB in another six weeks. (Normally, according to him, decisions take three months. Accordingly, since the FIT proposal was submitted six weeks ago, it should be ready in another six.)

FIT gives RE generating schemes a higher price than regular electricity sources. Thus it covers run-of-the-river schemes, bio-mass, wind, solar, and ocean. But each of these RE systems need a price advantage that would serve as incentive for the extra cost without burdening the consumer unnecessarily.

Since these price incentives are to last for 20 years, a review will have to be done after three years and bi-annually after that. For example the solar electricity producers need a higher rate than the small hydros. And that is correct because the technology in solar is new and still developing.

But its cost price has been going down about 10% every year while run-of-the-river hydros have a technology that is mature and well developed. Hopefully these higher prices for RE electricity will result in our having 50% of our electricity generation from renewable sources in 20 years.

The pricing is critical so that it really becomes an incentive to use RE sources without burdening the consumer too much. Ultimately, the consumer will have to pay for this incentive. If it is too low it might not serve its purpose as incentive or if it is too high it will add to consumer cost unnecessarily. The experience of the countries that have used FIT from Germany down to Sri Lanka is that the added electricity cost would be about 1% to 3% to normal cost. In the Philippines, some estimate that FIT will add about 12 centavos to the kilowatt hour.

The Philippines has the highest or next to the highest electricity cost in the region. While our neighbors are reporting $0.08 to $0.10 in US dollars, we pay about $0.14 to $0.16.  In isolated islands like Palawan, the electricity charge is R15 per kilowatt or $0.34.  This is because electricity generation is from bunker or diesel. Not only is it expensive but also polluting and unpredictable in price.

We are blessed with plenty of rain water, a real boon. However, large dams or hydro sources would normally be a function of government. Any incentive for this to the private sector will have to be on a case-to-case basis. We also have a resource which is not available to many other countries, namely, geothermal heat.

One large oil company has announced that they are digging over 80 wells in Indonesia not for oil but for steam. But as an expat commented, one can dig around any of our hundreds volcanoes and one will hit hot stones.  Right now we are digging only where there is already a built-in source of water so the steam comes naturally.

But if there is no steam in a well all you have to do is pour water and these wells will produce steam. However, the steam wells depend on the quality of the water used. Otherwise the pipes corrode too early.

We also have the hot sun and progress in the technology of photo voltaic plates will some day give us another big source of electricity. Geothermal sources, although a renewable source, were not included in the FIT because the authorities saw no need for incentives for this source.

Ocean schemes using the differential temperature between surface and deeper waters in the ocean is being experimented in Zambales.  Hope we get abundant and cheap electricity soon to help our people.  <emeterio_barcelon@yahooo.com>