Filinvest eyes P19B power plant in Misamis Oriental

Filinvest Development Corp. plans to diversify into the power generation sector by helping build a power facility that is expected to cost as much as $450 million, or roughly P19.35 billion.

According to sources privy to the matter, Filinvest of the Gotianun group is now negotiating with other companies to form a consortium that will put up the facility at the Phividec Industrial Estate in Misamis Oriental.

Negotiations with prospective consortium members are now in the final stages, the sources added.

The type of fuel to be utilized in the facility has yet to be decided, they said.

Filinvest is expected to make an announcement once all the details of the planned facility have been threshed out.

In recent years, Filinvest, through subsidiary Filinvest Land Inc., has been trying to make inroads in the power sector.

Earlier, it signified its intention to bid for the decommissioned Manila Thermal Power Plant. But the company withdrew its bid a month before the auction.

In November 2007, Filinvest pursued another bid for the government’s 60-percent stake in then PNOC Energy Development Corp.

Filinvest Development Corp., through FDC Geo-Energy Holdings Inc., its joint venture with Int’l Power Masinloc Holdings Inc., had offered the second-highest bid of P48.525 billion for the stake.

However, it was the Lopez group’s Red Vulcan Holdings Inc. that emerged the winner, having submitted the highest bid of P58.8 billion.