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STATE-RUN Power Sector Assets and Liabilities
Management Corp. (PSALM) has moved the bidding of the Tiwi-MakBan
geothermal power plant later next month to give prospective bidders
time to complete necessary documents.
The 289-megawatt Tiwi plant
located in Tiwi, Albay and the 458.53-megawatt MakBan plant
straddling Laguna and Batangas provinces were originally scheduled
to be privatized as a package on June 4.
However, the nine prospective
bidders who pre-qualified asked for more time to complete their
deliverables, including conducting their due diligence.
In light of this, PSALM said that
it has moved the bidding date of the Tiwi-MakBan plant to June 27.
In its Supplemental Bid Bulletin
No. 3 released in early May, PSALM, which is tasked to privatized
state-owned National Power Corp.’s (Napocor) generating and
contracted capacity, said that the submission of documentary
deliverables was also extended by another week to give foreign
bidders more time to secure their authenticated documents from the
Philippine consular offices abroad.
The pre-qualified bidders include
AP Renewables Inc., Intergen, Philippine National Oil Co.-Energy
Development Corp., San Miguel Energy Corp., AES Corp., Suez
Tractebel, Korea Electric Power Corp., and One Energy of China Light
& Power and Mitsubishi of Japan.
The Tiwi-MakBan facility will be
the first geothermal plant to be privatized after the bidding for
the 192.5-megawatt Palinpinon plant was put on the back burner. The
Palinpinon auction failed to take off in the absence of a supply
contract.
Consequently, PSALM had allocated
more than 400-megawatts of power supply contracts to the sale of the
Tiwi-MakBan power facilities.
The contract sweetener will
provide the new owner a ready market for the electricity that the
power complex will generate.
The sale of the Tiwi-MakBan
geothermal complex is expected to bring PSALM closer to the 70
percent privatization target for Napocor’s Luzon and Visayas
generating assets. This would fulfill one of the preconditions for
implementing open access and retail competition in the Philippine
electricity industry.
The government and the private
sector are banking on an open access environment to spur competition
among generating plants, in hopes of lowering the country’s high
power rates as this scheme would allow industries and eventually
consumers to choose their suppliers.
--Euan Paulo C. Añonuevo
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