Maibarara geothermal plant nears commercial operations

MANILA, Philippines — The 12-megawatt geothermal plant of Maibarara Geothermal Inc. (MGI) nears commercial operations after securing spot market and grid connection requirements.

MGI said it secured the registration approval from the Philippine Electricity Market Corp. (PEMC) for its 12-MW Maibarara-2 geothermal project as a Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) participating generation facility.

PEMC, the operator of WESM, had earlier included Maibarara-2 in its Market Network Model, indicating that the facility’s dispatch schedules can be accurately monitored in the WESM.

“The WESM registration of Maibarara-2 clears the way for the facility to export power to the grid during the commissioning stage. The testing and commissioning of Maibarara-2 is estimated to start by middle of December. Export of power to the grid is expected soon after commissioning starts,” PetroGreen Energy Corp. (PGEC) energy trading head Dave Gadiano said.

MGI is a joint venture of PGEC with 65 percent, Phinma Energy Corp. (25 percent), and PNOC Renewables Corp. (10 percent).

The company also successfully installed and tested with the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) the Remote Terminal Unit (RTU) and SCADA system of the project.

“The completion of these two critical WESM and grid connection requirements is a significant milestone for MGI as these are technical prerequisites for eventual commercial operations,” MGI president Francisco Delfin Jr. said.

So far, MGI has completed with Japan’s Fuji Electric the target plate testing of M2 steam, a pre-commissioning activity in which the quality of the steam that will pass through the turbine blades is assessed.

MGI steamfield manager Pedro Callos said results of the said test showed that the supply steam for Maibarara-2 complies with Fuji Electric’s very high standards.

“This target plate testing is the culmination of the commissioning and testing of Maibarara-2’s steam gathering system which started in April 2017 with the steam flushing of the completed steam piping system and additional flow tests of supply well MB-15D,” he said.

MGI’s geothermal facility is currently the only active geothermal facility being constructed in the Philippines. It is the expansion of the 20-MW Maibarara geothermal venture which was declared in 2011 as the first commercial project under the 2008 RE Law framework by the Department of Energy (DOE) and was successfully put on stream in 2014.

PGEC is the renewable energy holding company of publicly-listed PetroEnergy Resources Corp. (PERC), which is part of the Yuchengco group of companies.

PERC earlier said it was projecting a 33 percent increase in net profit from last year’s full-year income of $5.9 million if its solar, wind and geothermal assets continue to perform well.