The silent surge of electricity will get charged up into the transport fleets of the power distribution business units of Aboitiz Power Corporation, as the conglomerate lines up the electric vehicle (EV) shift of about 400 of its service cars and motorcycles.

Anton Mari Perdices, chief operating officer of Aboitiz Power Distribution Utilities, sounded off the group’s plan to accelerate its service-anchored EV deployment to 40-percent by 2030; and to ramp it up to 100-percent by 2040.

In compliance with the mandate of the Electric Vehicle Industry Development Act (EVIDA) under Republic Act 11697, the Aboitiz group targets EV conversion for its 200 cars and 200 motorbikes being used by its core DU businesses -- covering five of its power utilities, primarily Visayan Electric Company, Davao Light and Power Company; as well as Cotabato Light and Power Company; then four of its industrial zones.

The EVIDA prescribes that all industrial and commercial companies with service fleets will have to ensure that at least 5.0-percent of their transport pool shall be electrified.

For Aboitiz Power, reinventing its transport service wheel started with the rollout of electric-fed vans procured from major EV manufacturer BYD Company at the cost of P2.0 to P2.5 million per vehicle.

“We start with these four vehicles, we have to test it really thoroughly to make sure it works; and then we’ll decide on the pace; and the speed and even the brand – whether to stick with BYD, or if we’re going to change,” Perdices asserted.

Apart from anticipated cost savings, he noted that the reinforcement on their electric mobility would run parallel to the 50:50 rebalancing ratio that the Aboitiz group had also cast for its power generation portfolio.

He added “electrifying our fleet will help us further reduce carbon emissions, lower operating costs, and contribute to cleaner air in the cities where we operate. This way, we are also helping empower the evolution of the cities we serve.”

Aboitiz Power President and CEO Emmanuel V. Rubio highlighted that their EV shift “is a step forward and a step in the right direction – we’re not just aiming to advance on our portfolio through generation, but also downstream.”

He qualified that beyond this transport re-fleeting paradigm, the company is working on a broader business game plan across the EV infrastructure chain, including possible supply aggregation that may arise from ‘virtual power plants’ when utilities and end-users eventually turn into integrated energy solution providers.  

“We have a strategy that we call ‘going beyond the core business’ where we can participate in the mobile energy storage platform – the value chain is long: from cars, to EV charging, to disposal and there are opportunities within the value chain,” Rubio expounded.

He divulged that Aboitiz Power is currently working with a consultant so the group can strategically determine which part of the EV development ecosystem they could penetrate for added business niche.

“We just don’t want the owners of electric vehicles to be consumers of electricity, but also probably sellers of electricity – in managing the charging. And we want to have that platform to allow our distribution utilities and the customers of our distribution utilities to play in that space – but we need regulations to govern that - like virtual power plants,” he stressed.

Once regulation and policy frameworks are instituted, Rubio further explained that “owners of vehicles through their phones or through their apps could just say: I’d like to discharge and I want to sell to WESM (Wholesale Electricity Spot Market); we want to be the aggregator – so there has to be regulation governing that.”

He conveyed though that this business model may not be feasible just yet, “but we just want to be prepared when that happens. We just want to make sure that we understand, we have the system and we have the business model to capture that opportunity in five years down the road; as long as there’s continuous influx of EVs into the grid.”

Rubio similarly stated that “as a leader in the energy industry, we want to incorporate innovations that will improve the efficiency and sustainability of our operations,” specifying that such transformative disruptions are getting into the fore amid the challenges of “climate change, global connectivity, population growth, urbanization, and digitalization, and these changes demand that businesses like ours transform to remain relevant.”