Philippines utility Meralco launches 850MW renewables tender
By Emiliano Bellini | PV Magazine | January 24, 2022
Through the procurement exercise, the power utility is seeking proposals to deploy around 600MW of capacity that will have to start providing power in February 2026, and another 250MW to begin commercial operations in February 2027.
Meralco’s building in Manila. Image: Lainecedillo/Wikimedia Commons/https://bit.ly/3qUlulH
The Manila Electric Company (Meralco) has opened a tender to contract 850MW of generation capacity from renewable energy sources.
Through the procurement exercise, the power utility is seeking proposals to deploy around 600MW of capacity that will have to start providing power in February 2026, and another 250MW to begin commercial operations in February 2027.
As a benchmark for the bids, the utility indicated a recent bid made by Terra Solar, a joint venture between Prime Infrastructure Capital Inc and Solar Philippines Power Project Holdings Inc, which proposed to build 2GW of PV and 4GWh of storage at a levelized cost of energy of PHP6.08/kWh ($0.12).
Selected bidders will be granted a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA). Interested developers will have until February 2 to submit their expressions of interest.
The government of the Philippines is also planning to introduce a Green Energy Tariff Program auction regime, under which it aims to allocate 2GW of renewable energy capacity. The country plans to install 15GW of clean energy by 2030.
Recent statistics released by the International Renewable Energy Agency show that the Philippines had an installed PV capacity of 1.04GW – driven by the country’s renewable energy law – at the end of 2020. Most of the nation’s solar facilities were secured under the old feed-in tariff regime, auctions, and net metering programs.
Source: PV Magazine