ILOILO City, Philippines — Pangilinan-led Global Business Power Corp. (GBP) will develop 300 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy projects as it ramps up its capacity to include sustainable energy solutions in five years starting 2019.
The company has formed a new strategy to build its renewable energy portfolio in consideration of supporting policies being laid down by the Department of Energy (DOE), GBP president Jaime Azurin said in an interview after the company inaugurated the GBP Institute for Energy (GIE) here.
“Our strategy is to minimize the fossil-based fuel,” he said. “That is the new strategy for us that we are going to adopt to address RPS.”
RPS, or renewable portfolio standards, is a policy recently issued by the DOE requiring distribution utilities to source a portion of their power supply from eligible renewable energy producers.
GBP is pursuing a new five-year vision where 300 MW of renewable energy will be developed, Azurin said.
The target will consist of solar power developments and pumped-storage hydropower project to be announced before the year ends.
“We’re almost at the end of development stage of using pumped-storage for ancillary. It’s a specially designed plant, in fact, it is only in Europe where you can find this,” Azurin said.
In terms of capacity breakdown, the pumped-storage hydro project is targeted to have a capacity of 150 MW located in the Visayas.
“It has to be big enough for ancillary services,” Azurin said. Ancillary services are necessary to support the transmission capacity, maintaining reliable operation of the transmission system and electricity supply in the grid.
For solar, GBP is planning 50 MW, including five MW in its remaining five-hectare land in its Panay Energy Development Corp. power complex, where the GIE is also located.
“To make it viable, it’s about 50 MW per farm. We’re going to use the land here (in the complex). And it’s part and parcel of our commitment to Iloilo City that we put up a renewable source,” Azurin said.
Other areas being looked at is Luzon, the company official said.
GBP is also planning to put up biomass power projects and is awaiting the DOE circular officially extending the feed-in tariff (FIT) scheme for the technology.
Currently, it has a total installed capacity of 854 MW, with facilities located in Cebu, Iloilo, Aklan, and Mindoro. In 2017, GBP acquired a 50-percent stake in Mindanao-based Alsons Thermal Energy Corp.
The company inaugurated yesterday its training facility to enhance energy efficiency through technical training, using a circulating fluidized bed boiler simulator to aid optimized operations of its power plant facilities.
Azurin said nearly P300 million was invested in the two-story, 1,863-square-meter training facility, which will serve as the learning and development hub for all GBP employees across its eleven power generation facilities in Panay, Mindoro and Cebu.
GBP chairman Jose Maria K. Lim said the training facility is the company’s strategic initiative to help move the country forward through the creation of a robust pool of highly skilled, highly dedicated professionals who can meet and even exceed the demands of the dynamic energy industry.
The company envisions to help build leaders who can enrich and expand knowledge in the sector.
Lim said a dynamic energy sector is crucial for economic growth. The government’s thrust to usher in a golden era of infrastructure through the Build Build Build program will require close cooperation from the private sector, and the GIE is a testament to GBP’s commitment to be a partner in nation-building.