San Miguel Corp. is set to submit to the Energy Department a tidal power plant project that can produce up to 20,000 megawatts of electricity.
“We will submit it to DoE in the next few weeks,” San Miguel president Ramon Ang said.
Ang said the Pacific Ocean Tidal Power Project was a 10-year program and “we can produce up to 4,000 megawatts in the fifth year of operation.”
He said the company planned to sell power to the grid for P5 per kilowatt-hour, with the price expected to drop to P3 per kWh once the company recovered its investment.
The Philippines has yet to build and operate its first ocean or tidal power project, and the government has yet to design the appropriate feed-in-tariff subsidies for such projects. A tidal power plant is a project that convert kinetic energy from tidal waves into electricity.
PNOC-Renewables Corp. earlier assigned local energy company H&WB Asia Pacific (Pte. Ltd.) Corp. and Sabella SaS of France to build the first ocean power plant in the country. It will also be the first facility to tap tidal energy in Southeast Asia.
The companies will deploy tidal in-stream energy conversion technology in H&WB’s three concession areas in San Bernardino Strait between Matnog, Sorsogon and Capul and Dalupiri in Northern Samar.
San Miguel is diversifying from a food and beverage conglomerate into an infrastructure and power group with long-term projects. Its infrastructure unit, San Miguel Holdings Corp. and Philippine National Construction Corp. earlier signed an agreement to jointly undertake the expansion of toll roads under their existing joint venture worth P554 billion.
The expanded road network will include extension of the Metro Manila Skyway Stage 3 project and the Metro Manila Expressway, or C6/Skyway Stage 4.
Under the agreement, SMHC and PNCC will build San Pedro-C6 Laguna Lake Road, extending the South Luzon Expressway from San Pedro, Laguna and passing along the shores of Laguna Lake and ending at C6 in Taguig.
Other projects are Tanauan-Tagaytay Expressway or Sky 8; TR5 which will extend SLEx from the end of TR4 in Pagbilao, Quezon to Matnog, Sorsogon; Sky 7, which will connect Taguig to Commonwealth Ave. in Quezon City; Buendia Interchange and Ramp Extension to Macapagal Boulevard; and Sky 9 or the Pasig River Alignment which will included ramps to Buendia, Pioneer and Bonifacio Global City.
San Miguel and PNCC were also studying to develop a P700-billion expressway that will connect Quezon, Bicol and Samar in Leyte.
Last year, San Miguel posted a net income of P52 billion, up 80 percent from a year ago, as revenue rose 2 percent to P685 billion.
