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ALSONS Consolidated Resources, Inc. (ACR) plans to
expand its involvement in energy sector by exploring other biofuel
projects in the next five-years.
Tomas I. Alcantara, ACR chairman
said the company has set aside $750 million for energy-related
investments at the same time that it is about to complete the
feasibility study for a 100,000 liters-per-day fuel-grade ethanol
plant in northern Mindanao using cassava as feedstock.
“We should be able to see
commissioning of at least one project by 2011 and we are confident
that these enterprises will significantly contribute to ACR’s
growth and profitability,” Alcantara said during the recent
stockholders meeting.
For the ethanol project in
Northern Mindanao, Alcantara said ACR will be engaged in direct
production of cassava tubers chips that would account for at least a
fourth of the plant’s feedstock requirement.
“The balance of the raw
material inputs would be outsourced from contract growers in the
area,” he added.
In ACR’s estimate, 10,000
hectares of farm lands would be needed to fully meet the
requirements of the alcohol refinery, as it expects the plant to be
commercially operational within two years.
“With this project on Northern
Mindanao on stream, it is our intention to immediately proceed with
the next phase of our project, which is to establish a second
ethanol refinery in Southern Mindanao,” the official said.
Alcantara earlier said ACR and
its partners planned to build a 200- megawatt generating unit in the
west coast of Southern Mindanao to address a looming power shortage
in the country’s second largest island.
He said the facility can be
expanded up to 900 megawatts to keep in step with the growing
Mindanao economy.
Statistics from the National
Economic Development Authority indicate that Mindanao grew by an
average of 4.04 percent a year from 2001 to 2006, slower than the
national average of 5.18 percent.
Almost 40 percent of Mindanao’s
economy is derived from agriculture, significantly higher than the
national figure of around 20 percent.
--Chino S. Leyco
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