AboitizPower exec: Solar energy alone can’t prevent Mindanao power shortage

Business Mirror
TUESDAY, 25 OCTOBER 2011 18:57 BUTCH D. ENERIO / CORRESPONDENT


CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY - A top executive of Aboitiz Power (AP) said solar power alone is not the answer to the power shortage in Mindanao because of its very low efficiency rate and its very high cost.


Manuel M. Orig, First Vice President for Mindanao Affairs of AP, also defended Energy Secretary Rene Almendras from calls for his replacement by Cagayan Electric Power and Light Co. (Cepalco) official Dave Tauli, who accused the government official of being biased against solar energy.


Tauli, in his letters sent to media, accused Almendras of blocking solar power in Mindanao.


Tauli also said the opposition to renewable energy projects stems from “owners and proponents of oil- and coal-fueled power plants…” and that “Renewable Energy (RE)-based power plants will make unnecessary the coal-power plant proposed for Davao City.”


Orig said that what Mindanao needs at the moment is base loadpower plants which can run 24/7 and are not climate dependent, just like solar. Solar power, he said, will only run 16 percent of the time, when there is sunlight.


AP is proposing to build a 300-megawatt (MW) circulating fluidized-bed power plant in southern Davao and five run-of-river hydro-power plants in Davao City, Davao del Sur and Bukidnon.


“The 300-MW baseload plant we propose cannot in any way be made unnecessary by the RE-based power plants most favored by Mr. Tauli---solar PV [photovoltaic]. A baseload plant by definition provides a reliable foundation of power generation for a power grid. It should be able to run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year on reasonably priced fuel,” Orig said.


Orig also underscored solar as not reliable as fossil-based power plants; it is also very costly.


“One hundred megawatts (MW) of solar PV will cost the country around P2.5 billion a year even if it will only provide less than 2 percent of Mindanao’s annual power generation,” Orig said.


To recover the cost of the investors of solar power, Filipinos power consumers nationwide will be made to pay P2.1 billion in subsidy for 20 years.


“P2.1 billion can build us 2,625 classrooms in 20 years; you do the math,” Orig said.


Other power producers will have to sell their power in the free market without subsidy, making the playing field uneven, he said.