Negros Occidental has potential power from sugar mills

By Teresa Ellera-Dulla

Sunday, September 4, 2011

NEGROS Occidental has a potential of 150 megawatts (MW) of power from existing sugar mills, said Roberto Montelibano, regional head of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

He said that aside from sugar, the mills could also have cogeneration plant using bagasse to produce power.

Bagasse is the fribrous matter that remains after sugarcane are crushed and extracted of its juice.

“If everybody cooperates on the project, we would not suffer from high price of power from coal and even geothermal,” Montelibano said.

“We should look at Bukidnon where the cost of power is lesser than in the Visayas and Mindanao because they utilize the potential of the sugar mills in cogeneration plant,” he said.

Montelibano pushed the idea after he learned about ethanol in a meeting with the Sugar Regulatory Administration.

He said the problem on tariff is still a problem in the country. “We are supposed to have a 10 percent blend of biofuel or ethanol as mandated by the law; however, the ethanol used in the country are still imported from other countries because we are not producing ethanol.”

An ethanol plant, he said, requires 10,000 hectares of sugarland, adding that sugar planters preferred their canes for sugar because of good price.

Published in the Sun.Star Bacolod newspaper on September 05, 2011.