By Victor V. Saulon, Sub-Editor
ABOITIZ Power Corp. (AboitizPower) expects new power plants that will post their first full-year operations in 2020 to more than make up for the decline in its profit and revenue figures this year, its incoming president said.
“I’m bullish about next year. I’m very bullish about next year. For one, we’ve addressed most of the outage issues that we’ve had. Second, all these new capacities will be available 2020,” said Emmanuel V. Rubio, AboitizPower chief operating officer, in a briefing on Wednesday night.
Asked about the possibility of a reversal of this year’s slowdown, he said: “For sure.”
Mr. Rubio, who will become the company’s president and chief executive officer next year, said its Therma Visayas, Inc. (TVI) went online with its first 150 megawatts (MW) in April this year, with the other 150 MW going online in August.
“So now I have 300 MW available for the full-year 2020,” he said.
He said AboitizPower unit Hedcor, Inc. started operating an additional 28 MW in March this year to make the hydroelectric power plant in Manolo Fortich, Bukidnon operating at its full 68.8-MW capacity next year.
“La Trinidad hydro, which is also FiT- (feed-in tariff) eligible, will be available for the full year. It’s 19 [MW],” he said, referring to another Hedcor project.
“And the big thing really is GNPD (GNPower Dinginin Ltd. Co.). That’s a lot. That’s a huge capacity,” he added.
The Dinginin plant in Bataan is developing a supercritical coal-fired power plant with two identical units with a net capacity of 668 MW each. The plant’s first unit was previously scheduled to go online in October 2019.
Mr. Rubio said the first unit of the plant is expected to come in “probably earliest is April and the other unit is towards fourth quarter of 2020.”
His bullish outlook comes after AboitizPower on Wednesday reported its net income declined 19% to P13.5 billion for the first nine months of 2019 “due to the higher volume and cost of purchased power, lower spot market revenues, and lower plant availability.”
AboitizPower made up 60% of the total income contributions from the strategic business units of holding firm Aboitiz Equity Ventures, Inc. (AEV).
“We continued to push our balanced mix strategy because we believe that the long-term energy security of the country can be solved by balancing sustainability, accessibility, and reliability of power. To date, our net attributable capacity is 3,483 MW and we will definitely hit our goal of 4,000 MW of net attributable capacity by next year. This translates to about 23 terawatt-hours (TWh),” Mr. Rubio said.
“After 2020, our sights are set for the next 10 years and our goal is to deliver about 40 TWh domestically,” he added.
Mr. Rubio said AboitizPower would continue to pursue its international aspirations, specifically in Vietnam, Indonesia, and Myanmar, with focus on renewable projects in wind, hydro and solar, and also look at gas.
“And when we achieve our RE and international goals, we would have built a 50:50 Cleanergy and Thermal energy mix,” he said. “With these targets in place, we are confident that AboitizPower will sustain its growth momentum and continue to advance business and communities in the next 10 years and beyond.”
On Thusday, shares in AboitizPower went down by 0.89% to P38.80 each.
