JG Summit to build power plant in Negros

Gokongwei-led JG Summit Holdings announced it will construct a multi-million energy generating plant in Negros to fuel the sugar and mill refinery of its sister firm Universal Robina Corp. (URC).

JG Summit will put in P140 million for the construction of a 12-megawatt generating facility that will have an estimated yearly off-take of over 48 million kilowatt per hour.

The Bagasse Fired Power Generating Plant, located in Kabankalan Negros Occidental, will be 98.65 percent Filipino owned while the remaining 1.35 percent will be foreign owned.

JG Summit disclosed it will eventually be creating a subsidiary company to run the 12 MW generating facility.

The project, which will be operational by October next year, will be located within the URC compound in Kabankalan Negros Occidental. The plant will create 25 new jobs.

The power generated will be used by URC sugar mill and refinery. By the start of the plant’s commercial operations, it will be URC’s primary power provider independent from URC’s manufacturing operations.

Meanwhile, the publicly listed company said any excess power to be generated will be offered to the grid or local electric distributors. JG Summit said this could potentially be the nearest local cooperative, which is Negros Occidental Electric Cooperative (NONECO).

The power generation project has qualified to receive fiscal and non fiscal incentives from the Board of Investments (BOI), the investment monitoring arm of the Department of Trade and Industry.

It was registered as a new operator and classified under the energy- power generation of the Investment Priority Plan (IPP) of the government.

The project will be using indigenous and renewable energy source specifically the bagasse fired power generation.

The project is in support of the government’s program to encourage private sector participation and promote utilization of indigenous and renewable energy sources in power generation to reduce dependence on imported fuel as endorsed by the Department of Energy (DOE).