MANILA – The country will need at least USD121 billion of investments in renewable energy between 2020 to 2040 to achieve the Clean Energy Scenario (CES), a Department of Energy (DOE) official said Monday.
At the Sulong Pilipinas Conference Tuesday, DOE Undersecretary William Felix Fuentebella said the estimated investment requirements for renewable energy technology exclude system costs such as reliability cost, transmission and distribution requirements, energy storage solutions, and other ancillary services.
Under the CES, the DOE aims at least 10,000 megawatts of additional capacity in renewable energy by 2040.
The DOE also targets to increase the share of renewable energy in the power generation mix to 35 percent by 2030 and more than 50 percent by 2040.
Fuentebella said that aside from providing clean energy sources for the country, renewable energy will also help in energizing remote and unserved areas.
Supporting the government’s call on clean energy investments, Filinvest Development Corp. president and chief executive officer Josephine Gotianun-Yap said the company is keen on pursuing projects in renewable energy.
“We, definitely, are pursuing renewable energy projects. We have about 56 megawatts (MW) of renewable energy projects that we are running after,” Gotianun-Yap said at the mid-year economic forum of the Economic Journalists Association of the Philippines (EJAP).
She said the firm is also into solar rooftop installation, with currently 4.3 MWs of solar rooftop projects.
Gotianun-Yap is also optimistic that as prices of renewable energy technology such as solar panels and batteries become more competitive, there will be more investments for the country’s renewable energy sector. (PNA)