Danessa Rivera (The Philippine Star)
- December 19, 2019 - 12:00am
MANILA, Philippines — The Department
of Energy launched an online monitoring and trading platform for renewable
energy certificates (RECs) to further comply with the RE Law of 2008.
During the launch Tuesday, Energy
Secretary Alfonso Cusi said the PREMS would be used by the RE registrar to
track, monitor, and assess the implementation and compliance to the Renewable
Portfolio Standards Rules (RPS) for both on-grid and off-grid areas.
He said the PREMS—which will be
operated by the Philippine Electricity Market Corp. (PEMC) as the RE registrar
starting Jan. 1, 2020 – would be a tool to ensure that industry participants
comply with the RPS requirements and other policy mechanisms provided for by
the RE Law.
“The creation of the PREMS
highlights the prospects of the country in empowering the Filipino to venture
further into the modern trends that include smart metering, micro grids, block
chain utilization, and the global movement towards sustainable energy
technologies,” Cusi said.
The DOE expects a faster transition
towards a greener energy environment with the operation of PREMS, especially as
the agency recently promulgated the Renewable Energy Market (REM) Rules and RPS
Rules.
“The PREMS, as an on-line enterprise
platform, will facilitate market competitiveness, efficiency, and transparency
in the trading of RE certificates based on the REM Rules,” Cusi said.
A mechanism under the RE Act, the
REM is a market for the trading of RECs under the RPS and green energy option
program (GEOP).
RPS requires distribution utilities
to source a portion of their power supply from eligible renewable energy producers
while GEOP empowers end-users to choose renewable energy resources for their
energy requirements.
The PREMS was originally scheduled
for implementation in January 2019.
The development of PREMS is part of
the joint effort of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the DOE
and Global Environment Facility (GEF) called Development for Renewable Energy
Applications Mainstreaming and Market Sustainability (DREAMS) Project.
UNDP and GEF have given the DOE a
financial grant amounting to $38 million for the project, which is aimed to
reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by promoting and facilitating the
commercialization of the RE markets through the removal of barriers to increase
investments in RE-based power generation projects.
Meanwhile, climate and environmental
advocates, faith-based organizations, labor groups, youth, women’s groups, and
power consumers have reiterated their call to shun coal and develop more clean
energy projects.
The Power for People Coalition (P4P)
said the current administration must help itself walk President Duterte’s clean
energy talk by severely reviewing existing policies in the energy sector which
enabled the dominance of destructive and expensive electricity from coal at the
cost of consumers’ welfare.
Citing a report by the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) last year, P4P said radical
changes in the power sector must be done in order to comply with the Paris
Agreement.
“As the Philippines is among the
countries in the world most vulnerable to climate disasters, all corporations,
financial institutions, and government bodies within or outside our shores
still insisting on the use of coal are obstructions to our path to survival,
and to a future powered by clean energy,” Arances said.
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