SPECIAL REPORT: Dirty coal a thing of the past

(Last of three parts)

MANILA, Philippines - Coal plant operators in the Philippines insist that the era of dirty coal is gone.

Technology has significantly improved, according to businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan, chairman of Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), which, through its power generation subsidiary MGen, is also a coal power player.

“On many respects, those fears are misplaced because technology has moved further on to improve the quality of coal-fired power plants. And the ability to comply with the environmental standards have improved,” Pangilinan told The STAR in a recent interview.

Meralco’s MGen, together with the Aboitiz Group, wants to build a 600-megawatt coal-fired power plant in Subic, but the project is currently stuck in a legal battle because of opposition from local communities.

Businessman Tomas Alcantara, whose family owns Alsons Consolidated Resources Inc., a major power player in Mindanao has the same position on coal.

“The technology of coal now is much improved than before.  That is a scientific fact. In addressing all these fears, we always tell our people that we are undertaking measures to mitigate the impact. For example, we have reforestation projects. So for example, in ensuring that the pristine waters of Sarangani remain pristine, we have made sure that we are mitigating the whole impact of our disturbances by ensuring the growth of corals close to our plant, but outside our sphere of influence,” Alcantara told The STAR.

He said given the country’s state of development, coal is the only alternative.

“Yes, there’s solar but can we afford it?” Alcantara said.

“Dirty coal is a thing of the past. It doesn’t happen anymore. It would be misleading to say it is still prevalent,” Joseph Nocos, vice-president for Business Development of Alsons, also said in an interview.

Nocos explains that when coal is burned and you have the proper technology to address the pollutants that will arise from the combustion of coal, then coal is safe for use in power generation.

“The problem sometimes when people claim that there is no such thing as clean coal they tend to generalize and they tend to use a disparate set of data and assumptions to lead to the conclusion that coal is not clean,” he lamented.

“But what we are talking about is whether or not it is safe to use coal for power generation, and the answer there is yes,” he stressed.

The present-day technology uses a scrubbing agent that captures the sulfur dioxide emissions. In the past, this was not used.

In the so-called circulating fluidized bed (CFB) technology for instance, coal is mixed with limestone, which helps in the combustion process.

“(The limestone) serves as the scrubbing agent that captures the sulfur so when the emission comes out of the chimney the sulfur dioxide emissions are reduced,” Nocos explained.

“It’s an effective solution,” he added.

In all, Nocos insists that the use of coal could continue without adverse effects on the environment and without exacerbating the global warming problem.

Alsons is presently developing two coal-fired power plants, which it said would help alleviate the power shortage in Mindanao.

George Ty’s Global Power Business Power Corp., a major power player in the Visayas, said building coal-fired plants meets the needs of the communities.

“We build coal plants because it is a required technology for the needs of the community,” said Jaime Azurin, vice-president for Business Development of Global Power. He said coal-fired power plants are cheaper compared to other technologies thus providing cheaper electricity to communities.

Global Business is the leading independent power provider in the Visayas, with a combined total capacity of 633 megawatts of power supplied to the Visayas region.

It currently owns and operates nine power plants with a total installed capacity of 627 megawatts (MW).

Against this backdrop, anti-coal groups such as Greenpeace accuse the Aquino administration of being pro-coal, but Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho Petilla said this is not the case.

According to Petilla, coal is an important source of fuel in the country. He argued, the Philippines cannot rely on RE alone even if that’s the ideal scenario. Advanced countries, he said, are pushing for coal but are also pushing for RE.

“We’re coming up with a fuel mix. We want to put a mix where we have non-coal such as gas, liquefied natural gas. We want to go for renewable energy. (RE) Do you know that in Germany, they are pushing for RE but they are also pushing for coal. We cannot survive on RE alone. We have to have base load plants. In the Philippines, the only thing available for us for base load is coal and diesel, and diesel is more expensive. There’s another thing available, which is nuclear. We’re also studying nuclear. We have a team studying nuclear but for practical reasons, what is accepted here is diesel and coal,” Petilla said.

He agreed with coal players that the new technology now has improved the quality of coal emissions but he acknowledges Department of Environment and Natural Resources could also put in place additional measures to make sure that even existing plants could be upgraded.

“We continue to formulate the policy because we continue to receive information such as the cost of health. We’re trying to find out the health issues if we use coal or diesel or gas. We are looking at the real costs of each fuel of type,” Petilla said.

Right now, the government is still crafting its policy mix.

“The firm policy on the target will only come out when we do the costings,” Petilla said.

Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. country chairman Ed Chua said that when looking at the cost of energy specifically electricity, one should not only look at the cost of generating it but the social costs as well.

“In 2011, researchers from the Harvard Medical School found that coal power generation results in economically quantifiable costs to society amounting to anywhere from P4 per kwh to as high as P11 per kwh due to health impacts and climate damages by coal emissions.   One can, therefore, see that the implications go far beyond the prices paid for electricity generated by coal,” Chua said.

It is for these reasons that the World Bank, the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development have all decided to put forward energy policies that seek to end or severely limit financing for coal-fired power generation, he said.

Indeed, there is a need for the government to look into the real costs of power in the Philippines including the health costs. Anti-coal groups can only hope, it’s not yet too late.