Ayala Corp. exploring further renewable energy investments in Southeast Asia
Darajat Unit I owned by Indonesia Power (a PLN subsidiary) with steam supplied by Chevron (source: wienblog-growingtree/ blogspot)
Alexander Richter
31 Mar 2017
Philippines-based Ayala Corp. is exploring further investments in the renewable energy sector in Southeast Asia, following its acquisition of Chevron's geothermal assets in Indonesia late last year, a deal to close in the coming days.
Ayala Corp. made headlines in Southeast Asia, when it announced having won a bid to acquire the geothermal assets of Chevron in Indonesia in December 2016 in a consortium with Star Energy and Egco of Thailand.
The company expects the acquisition to close in the next few days.
The company has now announced that – through its subsidiary AC Energy Holdings Inc. – it now explores further investments in other Southeast Asian countries in the next 12-18 months.
AC Energy plans to expand its presence in Indonesia by working with existing partners in pursuing greenfield projects. “While it will take time to strengthen our presence in Indonesia, we have started to look around the Southeast Asia region and we hope to make our second regional investment in about 12-18 months,” Francia said.
AC Energy president John Eric Francia told reporters the company was closely looking at investment opportunities in Vietnam, after building a project in Indonesia. “In terms of being systematic, putting our limited resources to work outside the Philippines, it’s really Indonesia first and number two is Vietnam. The rest, it will be opportunistic,” Francia said. He said any future overseas investment should have “a good local partner with values that are aligned, (with) local capabilities, (and) a good pipeline of projects.
“We’re flexible in terms of technology. It could be renewable energy, gas, coal, it could be (a) combination,” he said.
“I would prefer to have small, mid-size where we can be a more meaningful partner as opposed to a very large platform where we are a financial minority investor,” the official said
AC Energy, meanwhile, reached 1,000 MW of attributable capacity in 2016 in just five years. The company recently set a new target of reaching 2,000 MW of attributable capacity by 2020, with half accounted by renewable energy projects.
So the company might extend its investments in the geothermal sector in the region.
Source: Manila Standard
