The government will postpone the open and competitive selection process (OCSP) for the 24 renewable energy resource areas that will be offered to local and international investors, an official from the Energy department said yesterday.
Mario C. Marasigan, director of the agency’s Renewable Energy Management Bureau, said the start of the auction process will be moved to January from today.
“We will postpone the OCSP launch because we are still working on some details like the venue of the event,” Mr. Marasigan said in a phone interview.
“We will move it to next year, possibly in January. The soonest we have a venue,” he added.
The official said during the launch, the Energy department will make the bid documents available to the investors.
“They can start buying the documents and start preparing their bids,” Mr. Marasigan said
The postponement of the OCSP launch would mean the entire timeline will be moved.
Mr. Marasigan said the new bid submission deadline will take place two months after the opening of the OCSP.
After that, a three-month evaluation period will follow.
Awarding is still expected to take place by the middle of next year, according to him.
Mr. Marasigan said the government is confident that the OCSP will yield good results, noting that there are local and foreign investors as well as some consortia that expressed interest to participate in the auction.
“The results of our stakeholder consultations in Davao, Cebu and Baguio were all very positive,” he said.
“We got very positive outlook in local communities and local governments. So we believe that as long as we can do the launching, we’ll have positive results,” he added.
Last month, Mr. Marasigan said the Energy department will offer four geothermal and 10 hydropower sites for development and utilization.
Two of the geothermal sites to be offered are in Mindanao, while the other two are in Luzon and the Visayas.
The 20 hydropower resources, meanwhile, are spread across the country.
Data from the Energy department showed that as of end-October, the government has already awarded 638 renewable energy contracts since the passage of the Renewable Energy Act of 2008.
Projects with capacity totaling 2,350 megawatts (MW) are operational, while 10,068.03 MW are in various stages of development.
The government has been actively pushing development of the country’s indigenous sources of energy in a bid to reduce its dependence on imported oil.
Besides the tender planned for renewable energy deals, the department is also in the process of auctioning off coal and petroleum areas under the fifth leg of the Philippine Energy Contracting Round (PECR 5).
Launched in May, the PECR 5 showcases 26 resource areas — 11 for petroleum and 15 for coal — that are offered to local and international investors.
The Energy department is scheduled to award new coal operating contracts on Dec. 18.
It received nine applications for seven coal areas during the bid submission deadline last Sept. 26. A post-qualification evaluation is under way.
For petroleum, deadline for service contract applications will be on March 31. Winning bidders will be endorsed to Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho L. Petilla on June 4.
Upon endorsement, Mr. Petilla will evaluate the applications and forward them to Malacañang for further review.
All petroleum contracts are subject to the approval by the President before awarding, as required by Presidential Decree No. 87.
Under PECR 4 in 2012, the Energy department offered 38 coal and 15 petroleum blocks to investors.
The auction attracted 69 bids for 28 coal contracts and 20 offers for 11 petroleum deals, but only 11 bids for coal and three for petroleum were awarded.
There are currently 29 petroleum contracts and 66 coal contracts that are under various stages of exploration and development.
