World’s largest: P150B raised for Luzon solar farm 

MANILA, Philippines — SP New Energy Corp. (SPNEC) has secured a P150-billion loan deal with six local banks to fuel the construction of its 3,500-megawatt (MW) solar plant in Luzon, potentially the largest of its kind in the world.

In a disclosure to the local bourse Friday, SPNEC said its subsidiary Terra Solar Philippines Inc. (MTerra Solar) had inked a 15-year omnibus loan and security agreement with the following banks: BDO Unibank Inc., Bank of the Philippine Islands, Philippine National Bank, Security Bank Corp., China Banking Corp. and Metropolitan Bank & Trust Co. The group said the fresh funds would finance its integrated solar photovoltaic facility and battery energy storage system (BESS).
The remaining P50 billion will come from internal funds. SPNEC is Meralco PowerGen Corp.’s primary vehicle for developing the mammoth Terra Solar project in Nueva Ecija and Bulacan. READ: SPNEC makes headway in development of world’s largest solar farm The project includes a 4,500-MW BESS, which can energize more than 2 million households, according to Manny Rubio, president and CEO of MGen. The first phase, with target capacity of 2,500 MW, is expected to be finished by next year. The second phase, with a capacity of 1,000 MW, may go online by 2027. Late last year, the group signed several contracts to ramp up this development. Two Chinese firms—Power Construction Corporation  of China Ltd. and Energy China—were tapped to lead the engineering, procurement and construction. Chinese tech giant Huawei also clinched the deal to equip the power plant with BESS, which it claims to be its biggest BESS project so far. Renewable energy developers have been complementing their facilities with BESS, given the intermittency of clean energy sources in producing electricity. BESS allows them to store power during peak hours and then deploy them when the grid network requires more capacity.

TAGS: solar farm, Solar Philippines Nueva Ecija Corp. (SPNEC)