Stable electricity key to maintaining growth
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The Philippine economy has been growing robustly in recent years thanks mainly to President Benigno Aquino's transparency policies and the flood of cheap funds made available globally by the United States to revive its own economy.
However, for the Philippines to sustain this upward momentum, it has to have a stable supply of electricity, which is critical in attracting fresh local and foreign investment.
To this end, three companies – all leaders in their fields of expertise – have come together to develop a clean energy project that will help ease the country’s tight electricity supply.
First Natgas Power Corp, a subsidiary of the Lopez-owned First Gen Corp, and Siemens broke ground earlier this year for a natural gas-fired, 414-megawatt power plant beside the St Rita-San Lorenzo natural gas plants in Batangas City.
The 28-billion-peso (Bt20.4 billion) project – be built by Sta Elena Construction and Development Corp – will be completed in 2016, and will use natural gas from the Malampaya platform and eventually imported as liquefied natural gas.
The Filipino-German partnership calls for the construction of two more gas-fired plants starting 2017 to bring the total new power output to more than 1,300 MW.
Aquino thanked the consortium during the groundbreaking ceremonies “for their faith in our country and in our economy, which they have expressed not merely in words, but in [actual] investments”.
He said it was expected that the Luzon grid’s energy demand would rise to about 11,000 MW by 2016 from the present demand of 10,294 MW.
Since power plants take two to three years to build, the government is laying the groundwork now for new plants, he said. The goal, he stressed, “is not simply to meet demand, but to surpass it”.
Aquino emphasised that demand for natural gas was growing, with its share in the country’s total primary energy supply expected to grow from 8 per cent to 14 per cent between now and 2030.
Clean energy
Natural gas-powered generators emit only half as much carbon compared to coal-powered plants, resulting in cleaner energy that fulfils the country’s commitment to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Named San Gabriel, the new power plant will also use Siemen’s state-of-the-art seawater cooling structures, designed to provide safe, highly reliable, efficient and low-cost electricity.
Aquino said that while the plan to guarantee sufficient energy for the country “may just be a single item in the catalogue of things to be done in the grand and collective task of nation building”, projects such as San Gabriel are fitting symbols of the country’s economic success.
Siemens and First Gen contracted Sta Elena Construction and Development Corp to build the entire power plant, including the cooling towers, citing its expertise and track record in delivering projects despite tight deadlines.
