BANI–The country’s pioneer wind-solar plant project, to be built here by mid-2011 by a Filipino-Japanese consortium, may yet be the country’s alternative response to anticipated years of power deficit in the years ahead.

Mayor Marcelo Navarro Jr. said the success of the wind-solar power plant expected to generate five megawatts initially, will determine its role in a larger scale n the country.

The consortium installing the project, More Energy, headed by Mike Yuda as president and executive operations officer, is building similar projects in other parts of the country, among them Ormoc in Leyte and Davao.

More Energy showcased its project harnessing both wind and solar energy when President Benigno Aquino III visited Bani last December 7 during which he inaugurated a model Core Shelter Assistance Project of the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) in Sitio Olanen, Dacap Sur.

More Energy originally intended to build windmills in Bani to maximize strong wind inflow from the South China but results of a study conducted for a year and half, however, showed encouraging wind velocity at night but slower velocity during the day, which cannot sustain wind.

The company said it will produce windmills smaller than those installed in Bangui, Ilocos Norte by another company but more efficient

For the Bani project, the company will use a technology it has developed and been used in Brunei as well as in Vietnam, which taps both wind and solar energy producing five megawatts.

Yuda said the wind power component of the project is 20 percent with the rest of the power to be provided by solar power.

SIDE PROJECTS

Navarro said More Energy will also develop solar pump irrigation, an ice plant, and a fishport in the town as collateral projects.

Solar pumps will be used to irrigate rice lands in the town to enable the farmers to finally have two or three croppings.

For the ice plant, the wind-solar powered ice plant will convert seawater into ice that will help freeze fish being brought in by fishermen in Sitio Olanen, Barangay Dacap Sur daily before these are passed on to fish concessionaires for transport to various parts of the country.

Though considered an expensive plant, the wind-solar power project is expected to have a return of investment after five years and will be in operation from 20 to 25 years.

With Toyota as its partner, More Energy has tied up with the state-owned Philippine National Oil Company (PNOC), which will be in charge of marketing the energy that it will produce.

IRRIGATION

Meanwhile, another major project in the town is the P396 million Masidem Small Reservoir Irrigation Project of the National Irrigation Administration (NIA), which is now 47 percent complete.

Once completed in 2012, the project, located in the tri-boundaries of Barangays Ranao, Arwas and Calabeng, is expected to irrigate some 1,000 hectares of land and at least 600 hectares during the first cropping season.

Justino Ariem, general foreman of the contractor Mark Bild Construction, said the project will draw water from the Sapa Ongot to be stored in a 22-hectare impoundment area where a 29-meter high dam is being built.—LM

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