THE VIEW FROM RIZAL
Today, we join the rest of the nation in honoring our national hero, Dr. Jose P. Rizal, as the country marks his 128th birthday.
In last week’s column – which was published as we celebrated our 126th Independence Day anniversary – we reflected on Dr. Rizal’s call for the Filipino that he is worthy of independence when he said, “Our liberty will not be secured at sword’s point… we must secure it by making ourselves worthy of it.”
We surmised that his statement was meant to help us ponder what we intended to do with our independence. Did he mean to ask whether or not we saw independence both as privilege and responsibility? We said that Rizal – the province named after him – has answered that question well by proving that it can stand and prosper despite the adverse event of the 1970s when it was “dismembered” to make way for the creation of the National Capital Region.
Today, the province is playing another role in the country's continuing bid for independence – this time, energy independence.
The United States Department of Energy defines “energy independence this way: “It is the state in which a nation does not need to import energy resources to meet its energy demand.”
Based on that definition, it appears the country has languished through over a century of energy dependence. For the most part, our power generation plants have been using imported energy resources such as coal and fuel. This must have been the reason why the price of electricity zoomed up when oil prices experienced a spike in the world market. We also recall that when trouble started in Ukraine, power generation firms scampered for alternative sources of coal. Every Filipino household feels the stranglehold of imported energy resources.
This was why we were elated when, two years ago, when the new administration came in, then-newly-elected President Bongbong Marcos, Jr. said that the government under his leadership would push for the urgent shift from traditional power generation methods to renewable energy. He said, “The use of renewable energy is on top of our climate agenda.”
“We must take advantage of all the best technologies that are now available, especially in the area of renewable energy,” the then President underscored.
We were also elated by the response of the private sector to this “urgent shift” called for by the government. In recent years, we noted that the participation of the private sector in the shift to renewable energy has already been in high gear. Corporate giants are leading the transformation and are now investing heavily in renewable, sustainable, and environment-friendly methods such as hydro-power plants, solar, wind, and the smaller hydro-power plants using so-called “run-of-river” technology.
The “big dream” in energy independence is that by the year 2040, 50 percent of the country’s electricity should be coming from power generators using renewable energy.
We may not be too far off from the goal. Based on 2022 data, 58.5 percent of the country’s electricity is still generated using traditional fuels – coal and oil. Of the country’s 208 power plants, 21 are coal-fired. The good news is that some 35.5 percent of our power supply now comes from power plants running on renewable energy like hydro, solar, and wind.
Rizal province is emerging as an important contributor to this “urgent shift.”
Early this month, a new wind power project broke ground in the province. This is the 112-megawatt Tanay Wind Power Project. This is the second wind power project of the Alternergy Holdings Corporation led by its chairman, Vince Perez. This will be the second power project of its kind in Rizal. The first was the 54-megawatt wind farm in Pililla which has not only contributed to the energy mix goal but has also attracted tourists to that part of Rizal.
More importantly, the project makes the province worthy of being named after the Man who asked us how we plan to use our independence. We are using it to decrease our reliance on imported energy resources even as we protect the environment and the quality of the air we breathe.
There are other blessings that projects like the Pililla Wind Farm and the Tanay Wind Power project bring.
According to the Energy Tracker Asia, an institute dedicated to studying the use of renewable energy, the shift could bring about other major benefits to the country: energy security and sufficiency; reduced reliance on imports; local economic development, and favorable investment climate. This has already been proven by the Pililla plant: barely a year after it started operations, close to 400,000 tourists from many parts of the country had visited that wind farm and stood at the view deck to have their pictures taken.
We were governor of Rizal Province when Vince Perez approached us and brought up the idea of building renewable energy plants in Rizal. The idea excited us since this technology is environment-friendly and the Rizal Provincial Government has adopted a strong pro-environment stance.
We are glad that the province’s partnership with the private sector is helping bring the country closer to the big dream of energy independence. ([email protected])