Phl leads in renewable energy developments in Southeast Asia

The Philippines is leading in installing renewable energy developments in the Southeast Asian region and can still expand the presence of renewable energy footprint by targeting off-grid areas, according to the latest report of Capgemini, a French multinational professional services and business consulting firm.

Based on Capgemini’s latest World Energy Market Observatory report, the Philippines contributed 0.4 percent of carbon emissions globally last year.

“From a peer group and the rest of the world, you’re way ahead in not being a carbon emitter,” Capgemini executive vice president Perry Stoneman said.

The Philippines is also a leader in the region in implanting renewable energy projects, helping the country minimize its carbon emissions.

The report cited that the country has a five gigawatt (GW) pipeline of wind, solar, geothermal, biomass and small hydro projects under development.

In 2016, solar made up almost all of the $1-billion capacity investment as developers rushed to take advantage of a feed-in tariff (FIT), a 20-year incentive program, before it ran out of quota.

As government nixes the expansion of the FIT scheme, the penetration of renewable energy in the power sector can still deepen if developers can strategize the location of their projects.

“The levelized cost of electricity for renewables is getting cost effective if you have the right engineers and the right businesses that can site the locations in your country, in islands, that are better appropriate for wind and solar,” Stoneman said.

Renewable energy projects can also aid the country in meeting its electrification goals through microgrid developments. This can consist of storage, wind or solar projects.

“Another thing is that renewable projects are the easier way to get access to remote villages that might not have highly reliable electricity services… versus the centralized generation, transmission and distribution lines with heavy transformers,” Stoneman said.

“Renewable energies, which can be distributed energy resources (DER), could be the best way to improve the reliability of electricity in the provinces,” he said.

Given the continuing drop in renewable energy costs, Meralco vice president and head of marketing and customer solutions Jose Antonio Valdez said consumers should not be made to pay higher electricity rates to cover for incentives for renewable energy development.

“We’re already over indexed with the rest of Asia in terms of compliance with renewables. Our customers are being made to pay the FIT… Shouldn’t we be balancing these incremental tariffs that are being imposed on our customers considering that we’re already there as far as renewables is concerned?” he said.