Alson Power to pursue renewable energy projects next year

MANILA, Philippines - Alson Power Group of the Alcantara family will aggressively pursue renewable energy (RE) projects starting next year, after completing its coal-fired power plants in Mindanao.

“Our growth plan, after we finish the expansion of our coal plants, our main focus will be RE,” Alsons vice president for Business Development Joseph Nocos said in an interview with The STAR.

This is a natural progression for the company, from starting with 358-megawatt (MW) consolidated capacity of diesel, bunker-fired plants and modular generator sets to developing baseload, coal plants in Mindanao.

“We are looking at the requirement of the grid. Initially it was peaking capacity then it needed baseload capacity. After baseload capacity, the opportunity now is in RE. This is because of the environment created by law and abundance of RE sources in Mindanao,” Nocos noted.

The power generation arm of listed  Alsons Consolidated Resources Inc. has secured a total of 97 MW hydropower service contracts for four different rivers with the Department of Energy.

“We are already developing RE projects. We have three in Mindanao and one in Negros Occidental,” Nocos said.

The first to be built is the hydropower plant in Siguil River in Sarangani.

Nocos said the firm is now in the middle of bidding process for engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract.

“Tender will be completed by March 2016 and by the third or fourth quarter, we can start construction,” he said.

After the Siguil project, the company official noted they anticipate a six- to nine-month interval for the construction per project.

“By 2018, all of the four projects should already be under construction,” Nocos said.

Typically, a hydropower plant takes about three to four years to be completed.

Alsons Power is a major power player in Mindanao, operating the 103-MW diesel power plant of Mapalad Power Corp. (MPC) in Iligan City, the 55-MW power plant of Southern Philippines Power Corp. (SPPC) in Alabel, Sarangani and the 100-MW Western Mindanao Power Corp. (WMPC) plant in Zamboanga City.

It is currently building the first unit of its 2x105-MW Sarangani Energy Corp. (SEC) coal plant in Maasim, Sarangani. The second unit is expected to be finished by 2018.

It is also building the 105-MW San Ramon Power Inc. (SRPI) plant in Zamboanga City by next year, which is slated to operate by 2019.

By 2019, the firm will have a total generating capacity of 588-MW, which will fulfill more than 25 percent of Mindanao’s projected peak demand for that year.