Three geothermal prospects in the Philippines up for bidding
The Philippine Department of Energy is offering three geothermal sites as part of the latest round of the competitive selection process for renewable energy contracts. The Department of the Energy (DOE) of the Philippines is offering three geothermal sites as part of the 4th round of Open and Competitive Selection Process (OCSP4) for renewable energy service contracts. The sites are as follows: — Buguias-Tinoc (100 MW) — Mabini (40 MW) — Mt. Sembrano (20 MW). The deadline of bids for the projects will be on the 29th of August 2023 and the bids will be opened on the same day. In addition to geothermal, OCSP4 will be also be offering 13 hydropower projects and 3 wind energy projects. Local or foreign-owned corporations or associations are eligible to apply for the service contracts. The DOE has opened the sector to greater foreign investments in 2020 by allowing 100 percent foreign participation in large-scale geothermal projects. The Buguias-Tinoc and Mt. Sembrano geothermal prospects have been part of the list of the DOE’s study sites a s we reported back in 2018. Drilling has been done on the Mabini geothermal site back in 2017 by a consortium of Basic Energy and Phinma Energy. Source: Philippine Department of Energy ( 1 and 2)
Related Knowledge Center: ENERGY BASICS: geothermal
Geothermal energy, which exploits heat emanating from the earth’s core, provides a sliver of total energy generation in the U.S.: 0.4 percent of utility-scale generation of electricity was produced by geothermal sources, according to the Energy Information Administration.
But experts see significant opportunity for growth in use of geothermal.