BIZ BUZZ: New player to turn trash into cash?
For years, we’ve heard whispers about a facility that can convert trash at the Payatas dump site in Quezon City into energy.
These whispers soon turned into a near-solid plan after Manuel V. Pangilinan-led Metro Pacific Investments Corp. (MPIC) partnered with the local government to make the 36-megawatt (MW) waste-to-energy (WTE) project a reality.
The promise was simple, yet a source of hope for some Quezon City residents grumbling about the garbage problem at the Payatas dump site: MPIC said the P22-billion WTE facility could convert up to 3,000 metric tons of waste into electricity daily.
Since it’s been nearly eight years since the local government approved MPIC’s proposal—and since the Payatas dump site was shut down, for that matter—it is likely that the WTE may not actually be built, at least not now.
The trash problem has also only worsened.
When Smokey Mountain in Tondo, Manila, was closed in 1995 to make way for a housing project, millions of metric tons of waste were transferred to Payatas, and then to other landfills in Quezon City.
So this begs the question: Are we actually going to see a WTE in Metro Manila? Definitely maybe.
Sources told Biz Buzz that there’s a new foreign WTE player coming to town, and its plan is 10 times larger than that of MPIC’s.
In fact, we hear that the foreign proponent—with the help of a local partner—is eyeing a 350-MW facility. This is, indeed, a big deal, especially since a project of this scale (solar power plants, for example) have only been pursued by big names in the power sector.
If you’re wondering which country this foreign player is from, we’re told that you probably already have a watch made there. Abangan!
