Published December 27, 2016, 10:00
PM By Myrna
M. Velasco
If outright sale would not be an
acceptable option, state-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corporation
(PSALM) is contemplating on having an alternative scheme for the privatization
of the Agus-Pulangui hydropower complexes in Mindanao.
“There are several types of
privatization models – it could be outright sale, it could just be the service
component also; or corporatization,” PSALM Officer-in-Charge Lourdes S. Alzona
said.
She noted the company “is currently
understanding the details,” primarily of the privatization scheme that they
would be proposing to the Department of Energy (DOE) and PSALM Board.
Among the privatization options the
state-run firm has been studying is the one anchored on a pending Congressional
bill, wherein the Agus-Pulangui assets shall be placed in a new government-run
corporate entity – the proposed Mindanao Power Corporation.
Under that edict, the end-users of
Mindanao will have total hold of the corporate vehicle and the cheaper-sourced
electricity from the hydro plants will just flow to their benefit. The Agus
complex has 727 megawatts installed capacity; while Pulangui is of 255MW
capacity but both facilities already have de-rated generation since they first
came on commercial stream.
Alzona said “our mandate is to
dispose in three years all of the remaining assets, including the Agus-Pulangui
plants.”
The “corporatization scheme,” in
particular, may still place ownership of the assets under government; and only
the operation and sale/trading of capacity that shall be bestowed unto the
private sector’s charge.
The current government leadership is
bent on completing the privatization mandate on the assets of the National
Power Corporation (NPC) so it could partly raise the cash to retire PSALM’s
whopping residual debts.
As previously indicated, the scale
of unsettled PSALM obligations may still top P245 billion until the end of its
corporate life in 2026. Corporate longevity extension is a policy matter that
the Duterte administration had already thumbed down.
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