Filinvest unit, DENR to pursue Misamis carbon sink program

MANILA, Philippines — Gotianun-led FDC Utilities Inc. (FDCUI) has partnered with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to pursue its carbon sink program in Misamis Oriental.

In a statement, FDCUI said its wholly-owned subsidiary FDC Misamis Power Corp. signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with DENR-Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) in Region 10 and Barangay Sambulawan to establish a man-made forest in Misamis Oriental.

FDC Misamis also envisions to make the area not just a carbon sink forest per se but as a potential watershed or natural park that can be a source of clean potable water.

“The primary purpose of the project is to help sequester carbon emission to maintain the air quality in the province.

“This is more than just for compliance purposes,” FDCUI president and CEO Juan Eugenio Roxas said.

He was referring to one of the conditions stipulated in the Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC) granted by DENR-EMB to FDC Misamis for operating a 3x135-MW circulating fluidized bed thermal coal power plant in Villanueva town.

The first phase of the program involves a 20-hectare land area in Bgy. Sambulawan, El Salvador City.

DENR-EMB Region 10 director Sabdullah Abubacar said the program is crucial as it is seen to industrialize the country and address global warming.

“FDC Misamis’ carbon sink program, therefore, is a manifestation of the firm’s real commitment to provide the much needed power in Mindanao, but with intent to reduce carbon footprints in the country by 70 percent,” he said.

In late 2016, FDC Misamis secured regulatory clearance to start commercially operating its 3x135-MW power plant, which was inaugurated by President Duterte in September 22, 2016 as the first power plant commissioned under his administration.

Located in the PHIVIDEC Industrial Estate in Villanueva, Misamis Oriental, the power plant is a multi-billion peso investment that uses the latest in clean coal technology: the circulating fluidized bed boiler technology.

FDC Misamis is a subsidiary of FDC Utilities. Inc. and a member of the Filinvest Development Corp., the holding company of the Gotianun-led Filinvest Group, which has interests in property development, banking and financial services, hotel and resort management, power generation and the sugar industry.