By Juzel L. Danganan
MANILA, Feb. 16 (PNA) — The Department of Energy (DOE) will hold its first Renewable Energy (RE) service contract (SC) bidding , through Open and Competitive Selection Process (OCSP), on Feb. 23, said Renewable Energy Management Bureau (REMB) Director Mario Marasigan.
”Yes, OCSP will be held at Dusit Hotel on Feb 23,” Marasigan told PNA in a text message Monday.
The OCSP will feature 24 Renewable Energy (RE) potential sites, comprised of 20 hydro-power and 4 geothermal-power projects ranging from a capacity of 20 to 30 megawatts (MWs) each.
The hydro projects are mostly located in Visayas, while the geothermal projects are based with one in Luzon, one in Visayas and two in Mindanao.
The whole bidding can bring in Php 1.8 billion worth of investments, since the REMB requires service contract holders to allocate a maximum budget of Php 2.5 million for the development of a single MW. This is both for hydro-power and geothermal projects.
Marasigan earlier said that the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) and the National Power Corp. (Napocor) had studied the sites to be auctioned off. Thus, the projects to be bid out are commercially feasible.
Both local firms and consortia, comprising local and foreign companies, have initially expressed interest in bidding for the sites.
Marasigan also said the actual project launch would make bid documents available.
The submission period will be a month after the launch – from March to April.
It likely makes the deadline for bid submission on April 23, since Marasigan said the timeline was still the same but was just adjusted due to some delay.
The OCSP launch was supposed to be held on Dec 15, but was postponed due to the lack of venue. It was initially planned to have its submission deadline on Feb. 15.
Meanwhile, the REMB Director said the new schedule for the awarding of the bids will be on September. (PNA)