Philippines Plans to Kick Off Offshore Wind Auction by Year-End

September 6, 2024, by Adnan Memija

The Philippine government plans to begin a bidding process for offshore wind projects by the end of this year, with submissions due eight months after the tender’s initiation, the Manila Bulletin reports, citing Energy Undersecretary Rowena Cristina Guevara.

In April 2022, the World Bank and the Philippines’ Department of Energy (DOE) launched The Philippines Offshore Wind Roadmap, according to which the country has the potential to install as much as 21 GW of offshore wind capacity by 2040 with the right governmental and policy support.

A year later, the Philippines’ President, Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr., issued Executive Order No. 21 directing the country’s DOE to put together a policy and administrative framework for offshore wind development and to commence work related to grid development.

In a press release issued on 23 April 2023, the DOE said that it had awarded 63 offshore wind contracts so far, with a total potential capacity of 49.928 GW, which is enough to supply the country’s future electricity demand.

Several major players, including Copenhagen Energy, BlueFloat Energy, Corio Generation, and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, have expressed their interest in entering the offshore wind sector in the Philippines.

Copenhagen Energy and PGEC began to co-develop the projects off the coast of the Philippines in 2020 and formalized their collaboration by forming the partnership BuhaWind Energy Philippines (BEP) in 2022.

The partners are developing three floating offshore wind farms in the Philippines, namely the 2 GW Northern Luzon, the 1 GW Northern Mindoro, and the 1 GW East Panay.

Its flagship project, Northern Luzon, which could power 2,000,000 homes annually, was recently selected by the DOE as one of the frontrunners in the Philippine offshore wind market, said Copenhagen Energy in its recent social media post.

Corio Generation aims to develop up to five offshore wind projects totalling 3 GW in the Philippines off the coast of Cavite, Batangas-Mindoro, Iloilo, and Guimaras under wind energy service contracts (WESCs) that provide site exclusivity.

A couple of months ago, the company received green lane certification from the Philippine Board of Investments, which is expected to simplify the permitting process for the firm’s upcoming projects.

In June 2023, BlueFloat Energy announced that the company secured WESCs for four (floating) offshore wind project sites in the country.

According to the Philippine media, BlueFloat’s projects have a total capacity of 7.5 GW, with individual offshore wind farms’ capacities ranging between 1.5 and 3.5 GW.

In March 2023, CIP signed a 25-year Offshore Wind Service Contracts with the Philippines’ Department of Energy (DOE) for three offshore wind farms totalling 2 GW in capacity.

The company’s three projects are proposed to be developed offshore Camarines Norte and Camarines Sur, offshore Northern Samar, and offshore Pangasinan and La Union.