BNPP operation to bring down cost of power - lawmaker

MANILA, Philippines - The operation of the mothballed $2.3-billion Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) will substantially bring down the cost of electricity, Pangasinan Rep. Mark Cojuangco said over the weekend.

Citing studies, Cojuangco told a news forum in Quezon City that the 600-megawatt BNPP could produce electricity at P2.50 per kilowatt-hour, P2 less than the average cost of electricity generated by a coal-fired plant.

“We can cut the cost of power to the consumer in a big way by operating this plant, which our people have already paid for a year or two ago but which has not produced even a single watt of electricity,” he said.

Cojuangco is author of a bill that seeks the rehabilitation and operation of the Bataan nuclear facility.

He said besides its potential to cut power cost, the BNPP would also be “a lot cleaner than a coal plant, which produces more pollutants than a nuclear plant.”

He said the nation now has to rehabilitate the BNPP and build more power plants or face crippling power outages in three years.

“We are already starting to reap the fruits of our indecision on the BNPP and the need for more power plants,” he said, citing occasional brownouts in Luzon and the recent power outage in the entire Visayas.

He added that it would take three to five years to build a power plant.

“The BNPP, which is just lying idle and which cost our people more than $2 billion, can be operated in less than three years,” he stressed.

He pointed out that even if the BNNP would operate, the nation would still have to build more plants to meet growing demand.

“By the time we decide, the situation is so bad that IPP contracts would be foisted on us just like in the past and we have no choice but to accept them even if they would mean a much higher cost of electricity that would drive away investors,” Cojuangco said.

He was referring to the contracts that the Ramos administration entered into with private investors or the so-called independent power producers (IPPs), whom consumers are paying whether their plants operate or not.

Due to these contracts, the Philippines has the second highest cost of electricity in Southeast Asia after Japan.

Cojuangco said the expected power shortage in three to five years could bring the cost of electricity here higher than that in Japan.

He also said he has asked his father, billionaire businessman Eduardo Cojuangco Jr., and San Miguel Corp. (SMC), which the elder Cojuangco chairs, not to get interested in the BNPP.

“I have made that request to them so that people won’t think that I am motivated by personal or family interest in my advocacy to operate the BNPP. And they have obliged,” he said.

He was quick to clarify that his father and SMC would stay away only from the BNPP.

“In fairness to them, I cannot bind them not to go into building a new nuclear plant if they want to,” he said.

As part of its diversification program, SMC has acquired majority ownership in Petron, the country’s largest oil refiner-distributor, and a substantial stake in Meralco, the largest power distributor. 

Reyes scored

An international environment group yesterday criticized the ambiguous statements of Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes on the controversial revival of the BNPP.

Greenpeace Southeast Asia demanded a “clearer, firmer stance” from Reyes, who it said gave pronouncements that seemed to veer off from the possible revival of the BNPP even while officials of the Department of Energy appear to be actually working toward eventual tapping nuclear energy to boost the country’s energy requirements.

The group cited Reyes’ recent statement to the Manila Overseas Press Club on the revival of the BNPP, where he said the Philippines is not equipped with the infrastructure needed to run a nuclear power plant.

The group also quoted Reyes as saying that the country still “has to work on this and it’s a slow process but we have to get there eventually.”

“Secretary Reyes needs to take a clear stance on the issue of nuclear energy,” said Amalie Obusan, climate campaigner of Greenpeace Southeast Asia. – With Katherine Adraneda