SPNEC finds site for world’s largest solar farm

SP New Energy Corp. (SPNEC), the listed entity of Leandro Leviste’s Solar Philippines Power Project Holdings Inc., has secured 2,000 hectares of land bordering Nueva Ecija and Bulacan for a project dubbed the “largest solar farm” in the world.

In a disclosure, SPNEC said the properties acquired would allow it to eclipse the 2.2-gigawatt (GW) Bhadla Solar Farm in India, currently the world’s largest solar farm.

The planned “largest” solar farm, a combination of 3.5 GW solar and 4.5 GW battery project, will be led by Terra Solar Philippines Inc., a P200-billion joint venture between Razon-led Prime Infrastructure Capital Inc. and Solar Philippines.

Upon completion, the project would be the largest solar capacity connected to the Philippine grid.

A representative of SPNEC said the first phase of the project would be in the municipality of Peñaranda  in Nueva Ecija, near the border of Bulacan.

“We expect the updated tally to be reflected in our next quarterly report, from which our public shareholders should have a better appreciation of the assets in SPNEC,” said Leviste, founder of Solar Philippines.

The landbank was secured two months after SPNEC staged a stock rights offering (SRO).

The firm earlier announced that 1.88 billion shares were fully subscribed in the first and second rounds of the fundraising exercise that allowed it to raise P2.8 billion.

Proceeds from the SRO had been earmarked to finance various solar projects in the pipeline.

The company has been raising funds to invest a total of P10 billion for the development of 10 GW of solar projects.

Terra alone had bagged a supply agreement with power distributor Manila Electric Co. last month for 850 megawatts of mid-merit capacity, or power that will be injected into the system when the baseload or main facilities fluctuate.

—Jordeene B. Lagare