First Gen upbeat about geothermal biz paying off

Lopez-led First Gen Corp. is confident of posting better financial health with more clean energy capacities expected to come online.

In the first nine months of 2024, the company saw lower earnings, dropping by 16 percent to $206.9 million from $246.79 million a year earlier due to the weaker performance of its wind, geothermal, and solar operations.

Francis Giles Puno, First Gen president and chief operating officer, said the profit also took a hit from more expensive operating and interest expenses.

“But we expect this situation to reverse as we see additional baseload renewable energy to come from our ongoing 40-well drilling program and additional 83 MW (megawatts) of additional geothermal capacity from existing plants,” he said in a message.

While First Gen’s geothermal business Energy Development Corp. (EDC) chipped in lower contributions to the quarter ending September, Puno said the group would continue its aggressive well-drilling activities, with EDC seen to eventually gain a strong footing.

EDC, an all-renewable energy firm, has a portfolio of 1,464.5 MW, accounting for almost 20 percent of the country’s installed renewable energy capacity. Its primary source of power is geothermal.

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“Over the last many years, our priority has been in geothermal, through EDC. When you look at our balance sheet, our biggest investment is in EDC. When EDC generates earnings, we reinvest it in more geothermal,” Puno said.

First Gen has a total of 3,668 MW of installed capacity from its portfolio of plants that run on geothermal, wind, hydro, solar energy, and natural gas.