First Gen earmarks $600M for 4 hydro projects
First Gen Corp. is allotting at least $600 million to fund the rollout of more projects to strengthen its hydro business, an executive said on Wednesday.
Company senior vice president Dennis Gonzales said the group has four hydro developments in the pipeline. These include a 100-megawatt (MW) pumped storage facility and three run-of-river (ROR) plants in Mindanao.
For the pumped storage alone, the company may spend “a little over $200 million.” Construction works for this project may run for three years, Gonzales told reporters on the sidelines of the Philippine Hydro Summit and Exhibition.
The planned ROR facilities, with a combined capacity of 113 MW, will require about $4 million per megawatt.
“I can’t really say that we will build all of them next year because each one has its own process, although maybe the ones that are ready to build still have pending permits needed from different levels,” Gonzales said.
Currently, the Lopez-led group has three hydro assets,with a combined capacity of 298.6 MW.
First Gen said its hydro business helped lift its bottom line in the first three quarters this year. This, despite lower power demand and prices recorded by its natural gas and geothermal businesses.
The firm said contributions from its hydro business soared by 65 percent to P1.31 billion.
The 132 MW Pantabangan-Masiway power plant had a recurring net income of P742 million. The 165-MW Casecnan facility recorded a recurring income of P628 million.
Just this week, First Gen and Prime Infrastructure of the Razon Group completed their P50-billion gas deal.
