Energy resource developer Philippine Geothermal Production Company Inc. (PGPC), a subsidiary of Sy-led SM Investments Corporation (SMIC), will be spending P3 billion annually for the expansion of its geothermal exploration and production ventures to double its capacity to 600 megawatts. In a media statement, the company indicated that the new geothermal resource exploration areas it will be pursuing will be those in Cagayan, Daklan and Kalinga in Northern Luzon, and Mount Labo and Malinao in Southern Luzon. The company reiterated these targeted projects “will form part of PGPC’s annual investment of approximately P3 billion a year,” while also emphasizing that upon commercial fruition, they could shore up the company’s overall capacity by twice as much from today’s 300MW scale. “PGPC targets to increase its steam production by approximately another 300MW of baseload renewable energy through its new exploration projects,” the company stressed. As asserted by SM Investments President and CEO Frederic C. DyBuncio, the firm “is committed towards harnessing clean energy by increasing its capacity to provide steam.” The SM executive has cited that the Philippines’ ideal location within the ‘ring of fire’ has been providing “a huge opportunity for a low-carbon source of power,” adding that such was already a proven track record for the company within the realm of indigenous energy production for half-a-century span. PGPC is a well-entrenched player that has been exploring and advancing the commercial extraction of geothermal steam being supplied to the Tiwi and Makiling-Banahaw (MakBan) geothermal power plants that are sited in Albay as well as Batangas and Laguna provinces, respectively. The company narrated that as of March this year, “the MakBan and Tiwi steam fields have contributed to at least 57.5 billion kilograms in reducing carbon dioxide emissions since the start of its commercial operation,” and that redounds to 188,802 hectares of trees plantation. In the genre of "renewable energy developments", geothermal is typically classified as the "neglected child" because the investment perks being batted for by the industry players are not given prime attention yet by government policymakers and regulators. The Philippines used to be the second largest geothermal energy producer in the world, but it has been slipping in ranking through the years because of the paucity of investments in the industry through the years. Even the recent move of the Department of Energy (DOE) on opening up the geothermal exploration and power plant development to 100-percent foreign participation via the financial or technical assistance agreement (FTAA) had not exactly enticed a flow of fresh investment-dollars into the sector. Currently, it is the "brave soul" Filipino investors that have been breathing continued life into the domestic geothermal industry, hence, there is still that unbreakable cycle for this technology becoming part of the country’s energy mix for a longer term.