Renewables offer cheaper, more reliable power for Philippines' small islands - report

Renewables offer cheaper, more reliable power for Philippines' small islands
- report

The Philippines can save $200 million a year and build a more reliable
energy supply for millions of residents on its small islands by replacing
diesel generators with renewable sources such as wind and solar, said a
report released on Monday.

The switch would require at least $1 billion in private investment in the
short term, but the sum would be offset by savings of $200 million each year
- an expense currently borne by users, the report said.

Many of the archipelago nation's small islands cannot access larger
electricity grids.

Mini-grids powered by generators that use imported diesel and oil serve
approximately 800,000 households, but there are frequent blackouts, said the
report by the U.S.-based Institute for Energy Economics and Financial
Analysis (IEEFA) and Manila-based Institute for Climate and Sustainable
Cities (ICSC).

Less than 10 percent of 233 small islands have 24-hour electricity, while
more than 70 percent have less than eight hours of electricity per day,
according to the ICSC.

Modernising small island power systems with renewables will supply cheaper,
efficient, secure, cleaner power, the report said.

"Renewable energy systems are not only sustainable but affordable and secure
because there is no fuel requirements," Sarah Ahmed, IEEFA's energy finance
analyst and the report's main author, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Since 2009, solar power costs have fallen by 90 percent and that of wind
power has fallen 50 percent, the report said.

Yet many small islands in the Philippines have not turned to renewables due
to a host of factors including outdated regulations, it said.

This includes a lack of incentives for island electric cooperatives - small,
customer-owned utilities controlled by locally elected boards - to procure
cheaper sources, and slow implementation of a 2008 law meant to promote the
development of renewable energy, it added.

"Islands such as Sumba in Indonesia have already cut energy costs by 35
percent by following the global trend towards renewables," Jose Logarta,
ICSC senior energy advisor and co-author of the report, said in a statement.

Sumba, a mountainous island in eastern Indonesia, is using a combination of
wind, solar and small-scale hydropower to achieve 95 percent renewable
electricity for its 650,000 residents by 2025.

"This indicates a major opportunity for islands all across the Philippines,"
Logarta said.

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Link to Original Article:
http://af.reuters.com/article/energyOilNews/idAFL4N1IA3B9

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John Diecker
APT Consulting Group Co., Ltd.

www.aptthailand.com