The Meralco Group is in talks with a new solar industry player as they are in talks to build their portfolio in utility scale solar projects and solar rooftops, its top official said.

Meralco president Oscar Reyes said they are working on penetrating the solar power industry with the building of a utility scale, or ground-mounted solar project with a 50-megawatt (MW) capacity.

“On solar, we are hopeful that we will break in to the utility scale solar within a fairly short period of time. We’re also working on rooftop solar,” he said.

Reyes said the company will be partnering with strategic partners for their new solar projects, but did not give specific names of any firm.

“As typical with our power generation projects, we try to partner with strategic partners so that there is someone who vets and validates the feasibility of our projects,” he said.

“We would like to make that disclosure when we are able to finalize something,” he added.

The company disclosed last year that they are working on expanding their power generating portfolio by developing renewable energy (RE) projects.

Meralco chairman Manuel Pangilinan said they are also launching a new unit for their RE investments to be called MSpectrum, which will serve as their main avenue for solar rooftop and utility-scale projects.

Currently, the company is building coal-fired power plants with its partners, with 3, 000 MW of generating capacity.