EDC eyes partnerships to reach carbon neutral goal

MANILA, Philippines — Lopez-led Energy Development Corp. (EDC) is eyeing to forge partnerships with more Philippine companies to take steps towards becoming carbon neutral as it sounded off alarm in fighting the irreversible consequences of climate change, according to its top official.

“We are putting into action our revitalized mission in the Lopez Group to ‘forge collaborative pathways for a decarbonized and regenerative future’ by seeking partnerships and synergies with fellow enterprises in the country,” EDC president and COO Richard Tantoco said.

Tantoco echoed the latest findings of latest assessment report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued last August, which is the most daunting and alarming to date, pointing to irreversible consequences of climate change if no drastic action is taken to decarbonize the atmosphere.

Because of this, EDC spearheaded a movement to become carbon neutral called Net Zero Carbon Alliance, in line with the Department of Energy’s goal to reduce carbon emissions by as much as 75 percent.

“For this reason, we fulfill our mission by helping our stakeholders take concrete steps towards becoming carbon neutral. By forming a community where we can empower each other and be a part of each other’s journey, we create ripples of positive impact through pockets of excellence that collectively help our planet heal,” Tantoco said.

The Net Zero Carbon program is strategically developed to provide partners with a roadmap to attain carbon neutrality through the sharing of best practices and scaling up of carbon emission offsetting and tracking, as well as assistance in obtaining third-party certification of carbon emissions and  even access to green financing, among many other capacity-building tools.

Tantoco said one of the key strategies in driving down a company’s carbon emissions is to shift to renewable energy.

EDC generates power from 100 percent renewable energy (RE) sources and takes care of 270,000 hectares of forests in its geothermal reservations, making it carbon negative, Tantoco said.

With EDC’s established decarbonization mechanisms, partners can adopt these practices and leverage them toward carbon offsetting and sequestration.

The pioneering members of the Net Zero Carbon Alliance include property developer ArthaLand, Lopez Group affiliate and construction company First Balfour, sustainability communications agency Drink, Silliman University in Dumaguete, Negros Oriental, as well as the local operations of multinational firms Analog Devices, Coca-Cola, Knowles Electronics, and Unilever.

EDC is the country’s biggest 100 percent RE company that accounts for over 40 percent of the Philippines’ RE output and serves about 10 percent of the country’s overall electricity demand with its installed capacity of almost 1,500 megawatts (MW).

Its 1,181 MW geothermal portfolio accounts for 62 percent of the country’s total installed geothermal capacity and has put the Philippines on the map as the world’s third largest geothermal power producer.