Geothermal Firms Urge Government to Raise Green Energy Auction Prices

MANILA, Philippines — A group of geothermal energy developers is calling on the government to set higher prices for green energy auctions (GEA) to attract more bidders. In a briefing, the chief of the National Geothermal Association of the Philippines (NGAP) said they have created a technical group focused on the GEA to determine investors’ issues or reasons for not participating in government biddings. READ: PH needs $12.6B to reclaim No. 2 geothermal spot—DOE chief An auction conducted in 2023 saw weak results due to the incentives set by the Energy Regulatory Commission. The GEA-3, which included geothermal energy, also faced some delays due to the issuance of a pricing mechanism. “If you recall, in the last round of GEA 3, the government offered 100 megawatts (MW) of capacity that was bid out, but only 30 MW was taken by the industry because of several reasons,” said Jaime Jemuel Austria Jr., president of NGAP. Austria was speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the 7th Philippine International Geothermal Conference in Batangas. READ: 12 geothermal energy firms seek funding boost “So, we reconvened the technical working group to focus on the areas that can be improved—to improve the uptake of the industry, of the offer, in preparation for the next round of GEA, which is GEA-9,” he added. Austria, who is also an executive at Energy Development Corp., said that some components of the project development were “not factored in” in pricing evaluation, despite each asset having “its unique characteristic." At present, the government has a derisking facility set to provide an initial P10.7 billion to qualified developers for their exploration activities. INQ