By Lenie Lectura - November
5, 2019
AC Energy Philippines Inc. is
increasing its stake in a renewable-energy (RE) firm that operates an
81-megawatt (MW) wind farm in Ilocos Norte.
“At its meeting today, the Executive
Committee authorized the signing of a share purchase agreement with the
Philippine Investment Alliance for Infrastructure [Pinai] for the Company to
acquire Pinai’s ownership interest in North Luzon Renewables Energy Corp.
[North Luzon Renewables],” the company said Monday.
Pinai is a fund composed of
Macquarie Infrastructure Holdings (Philippines) Pte. Ltd., Langoer Investments
Holding BV and the Government Service Insurance System. It has a 31-percent
preferred equity ownership and 15-percent common equity ownership in North
Luzon Renewables.
AC Energy’s economic stake in North
Luzon Renewables is 36 percent.
The acquisition is subject to
definitive documentation and approval by the Philippine Competition Commission.
North Luzon Renewables is a joint
venture of AC Energy, UPC Philippines, Luzon Wind Energy Holdings (an affiliate
of Mitsubishi Corp.), and Pinai. The wind farm started its commercial
operations in November 2014.
The wind farm uses 27 units of
Siemens SWT-3.0-101 wind turbines, where each turbine has an installed capacity
of 3 MW.
AC Energy is formerly Phinma
Energy Corp. Conglomerate Ayala Corp. acquired Phinma Energy from the del
Rosario family for P6.3 billion.
Phinma Energy President Eric Francia
had said the company’s RE capacity is targeted to reach 2,000 MW by 2025 from
150 MW at present.
“Our vision for AC Energy
Philippines is to be the leader in renewable energy in the country. Our goal is
to reach 2,000 MW of renewables by 2025,” said Francia.
The power firm is prepared to spend
$2 billion to make this happen.
“With the government’s target of
renewables reaching 35 percent of energy output by 2030, the country would need
to build over 15 GW of renewables in the next decade. We will make significant
investments in this space,” said Francia, adding that renewables would have to
be complemented by other low-carbon technologies such as gas-fired generation
and energy storage, which the company will be exploring.
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