PSALM seeks guidance on sale of power assets

MANILA, Philippines - State-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management (PSALM) Corp. still has P565 billion in financial obligations for its remaining 10-year corporate life.

To reduce its obligations, the state-run agency is seeking guidance on the sale of its remaining power-related assets and a handful of real estate properties from the new administration, a ranking official said.

PSALM officer-in-charge Lourdes Alzona said in a chance interview last week the agency still has a handful of assets that could be sold, including major power plants, scrap power assets and real estate assets.

She said the agency has P5 billion worth of real estate that could be sold pending board approval, while the “excluded parts” should be disposed of as soon as possible.

The scrap assets involve all materials, scrap and plant equipment of Cebu Diesel Power Plant II (CDPPII) in Toledo City, Cebu, Palinpinon Geothermal Power Plant (PGPP) in Valencia, Negros Oriental, Bohol Diesel Power Plant (BDPP) in Tagbilaran City, Bohol and Aplaya Diesel Power Plant (ADPP) in Jasaan, Misamis Oriental.

These assets, targeted to be sold by 2017, were initially bid out in March this year. The bidding was declared a failure as no bidders met the reserve price.

On the real estate portion, Alzona said the agency needs to identify which ones could be privatized since these involve around 10,000 hectares of properties.

“We need to segregate those which have titles, which are alienable, and those that cannot be sold because they are government-owned,” she said.

Scattered across the country, some of the real estate properties include the Puerto Azul resort in Cavite and a property in Bagac, Bataan.

However, Alzona said the PSALM board is not keen on selling the Bagac property since it is earning. “We will not dispose this yet. The approval we got from the board is to improve its management,” she said.

Meanwhile, PSALM’s remaining generating assets include the decommissioned 850-megawatt (MW) Sucat Thermal Power Plant (STPP) in Muntinlupa City, Malaya Thermal Power Plant in Rizal, the Agus I, II, IV to VII and Pulangi Hydroelectric Power Plants (HEPP) in Mindanao and the Mindanao Coal-Fired Power Plant.

Of all the power assets left, only the Agus-Pulangi HEPP has value, Alzona said. The sale of the assets are subject to consultation with Congress as stated in the Republic Act 9136, or Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA) of 2001.

The Sucat plant is scheduled for another auction in September this year, after two failed biddings in 2014 and April this year.

PSALM is the agency mandated by EPIRA to handle the sale of the remaining state-power assets and the financial obligations of the Napocor.

As of end-2015, it has a P565-billion financial obligation, a big portion coming from independent power producers (IPPs) and concessionaire.

This has been reduced from the P1.2 trillion debt as of end-December 2000, or prior the passage of the EPIRA.