MANILA, Philippines–Proponents of the $5.9-billion Tampakan copper gold project in South Cotabato plan to sell excess power of about 50-100 megawatts (MW) from their planned coal power plant to the power grid, a move seen to help secure adequate power supply in Mindanao.
Mylene C. Capongcol, director of the Electric Power Industry Management
Bureau of the Department of Energy, confirmed a report in the draft Transmission Development Plan 2011, which stated that the excess power will be exported to the grid.
The proposed power station, which is targeted to be operational by 2014, is expected to generate an initial 250 MW.
Capacity may be ramped up to as much as 400 MW once the mining project starts full commercial operation.
Earlier estimates placed the cost of the coal facility at a steep $900 million or roughly P38.7 billion.
The plan of the mining project’s proponents—XStrata Plc, through its local subsidiary Sagittarius Mines Inc., and Indophil Resources NL—is to build the coal-fired power station before the mine goes into production.
The National Grid Corp. of the Philippines, operator of the country’s transmission system, had included in its plans the construction of a new substation to service the power to be generated from the Tampakan project.
The connection of the mine and the power plant will be via a new 230/138 kilovolt (kV) substation, to be located in Rizal town and will bus-in along NGCP’s Matanao-Gen. Santos (Klinan) 138 kV transmission line in South Cotabato, NGCP said.
The entry of this new capacity to the Mindanao grid, should the plan push through, is expected to help alleviate the power supply in Mindanao, which has been suffering from rotating brownouts due to its heavy reliance on the Agus and Pulangi hydropower complexes.
These facilities provide over half of the electricity requirements of Mindanao, thus making power consumers there vulnerable to extreme weather conditions, particularly El Niño or prolonged drought.
In 2010, Energy Secretary Jose Rene D. Almendras said he wanted the Mindanao grid to have at least 500 MW in baseload generation capacity from non-hydro sources such as coal, to insulate the island from severe power outages and unstable supply.
Almendras had said that Mindanao should have at least 500 MW of non-hydro baseload generation capacity “since we cannot predict exactly what the water levels will be in Mindanao in the coming years.”
The energy chief earlier admitted, however, that electricity prices in Mindanao would have to increase gradually to reflect the true cost of power and encourage the private sector to invest in Mindanao’s power sector.
The DOE expects several committed power projects in Mindanao to start commercial operations within the next five years.
These include Mindanao Energy Systems Inc.’s 20-MW bunker fired facility; Conal Holdings Corp.’s 200-MW coal facility in Saranggani; and Energy Development Corp.’s 50-MW Mt. Apo 3.