SURE pledges $90M to build power plants

LIPA, Batangas ─ Japanese-backed SURE Eco Philippines Inc. is investing about $90 million to build up to 30 megawatts (MW) of biogas/biomass power projects over the next two years. At the inauguration of its first biogas power plant here, SURE spokesman Clarence de Guia told reporters that money for those projects would come from loans and equity. SURE, which stands for Solutions Using Renewable Energy, would likely tap Metrobank, Bank of the Philippine Islands, and UnionBank, he said. The company might also seek assistance from the multilaterals Asian Development Bank and World Bank. De Guia said the 30-MW projects are on top of four other similar projects the company is now pursuing. In partnership with MG Leasing and the Umali family’s RLU Group of Companies, SURE installed a 400-kilowatt (kW) waste-to-energy facility in Silangan Farm in Batangas, one of the first industrial-scale biogas plants in the Philippines combining heat and power applications. SURE’s three others projects are in Bukidnon, Nueva Ecija and Laguna. The four projects have a combined 1.5-MW capacity and would cost more than $3 million. Money for those projects would come from MG Leasing. MG leasing is a unit of the Osaka, Japan-based Marubeni Group. A build-operate-transfer project with San Miguel Corp., involving 1.2 MW, is in Vietnam, the company said. "We have pipeline projects. Long-term what we want is to have a centralized or a bigger capacity. Our thrust is to have the most diversified renewable energy portfolio. We’re looking at mini-hydro and other forms of renewable energy," De Guia said. Earlier, SURE had partnered with Pepsi Cola Products Philippines Inc. for a state-of-the-art 1.2-MW cogeneration power plant with rice husk and wood chip as feedstock. De Guia said the $2.7-million cogeneration project for Pepsi Philippines won an award from the US Agency for International Development as one of two most promising clean energy investment opportunities in the country. —VS, GMANews.TV