AboitizPower to expand RE, eyes gas venture

MANILA – Aboitiz Power Corp. is looking into growing its renewable energy business and also venturing in gas projects in the next 10 years, its president and chief executive officer Emmanuel Rubio said.

“We’re looking at growing our renewable energy portfolio from what is today around 940 (megawatts) to close to 1800 megawatts,” Rubio said in a virtual media briefing Wednesday evening.

Rubio said AboitizPower has a land bank, a number of hydroelectric power and run-of-river hydropower plants in the pipeline, and also wind projects.

“We expect that the demand for renewable energy, the physical demand, will come in 2025 instead of 2023 because of the pandemic. The pandemic has lowered the demand a little bit and has delayed the need for the physical capacity for renewable energy,” he said.

Commenting on the Department of Energy’s (DOE) moratorium on the endorsement of greenfield coal projects, Rubio said the firm supports the view of Secretary Alfonso Cusi, noting this step is “in the right direction”.

On Wednesday, Cusi said his office would issue an advisory to stop the endorsement of greenfield coal projects.

“I think we’ve mentioned before that we are not going to do any greenfield coal plants moving forward,” Rubio said.

He added AboitizPower sees improvement in trends in gas, with prices becoming more competitive.

Rubio said it has organized a team to look into gas as a serious option for its baseload strategy.

“And this is something that we are considering for the next 10 years.

So given that the Philippines will require baseload capacity is anywhere from 680 to 750 megawatts year on year, so yes, gas is by far our strategy moving forward,” Rubio added.