Power interconnection from Palawan to Sabah eyed

NEA gets support from DOE official to become “authority”

The Palawan and Sabah power interconnection may soon be in the works, the Department of Energy (DOE) said.

During the recent Brunei Darussalam-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP -EAGA) Power and Energy Cluster meeting, the BIMP-EAGA Busniess Council (BEBC) initiated the partnership with the provincial government of Palawan.

“The Philippines will pursue coordination meetings between the private sector, National Government Agencies (NGAs) and the provincial Government of Palawan to be able to review existing policies and regulation on cross-border trading and to facilitate the timely execution of the proposed interconnection.” DOE assistant secretary Leonido Pulido III told The Manila Times.

DOE has expressed its support to the power and energy cluster that has the same agenda with the country in ensuring energy security, a low carbon future, targeting total electrification, and improving energy efficiency and conservation.

Pulido represented Secretary Alfonso Cusi at the 2017 BIMP – EAGA Strategic Planning Meeting.

The key output of the meeting included the formulation of the nine – year (2017 – 2025) Power and Energy Infrastructure Cluster (PEIC) Roadmap for: Power interconnection, renewable energy (RE), rural electrification and sub – regional energy efficiency and conservation (EE&C) rolling pipeline project as an input to the final BIMP – EAGA Vision 2017 – 2025 (BEV2025).

BEBC informed the participants in the meeting that the signing of the memorandum of understanding may be on April and when realized, “it will provide the needed capacity addition to the country,” Pulido said.