Coal power and the Phl’s energy conglomerates

Energy is development. More energy especially from stable, reliable and dispatchable sources means more leeway on the kind of modernization path a country can take.

- BIENVENIDO S. OPLAS JR.

Coal in particular is a very useful energy source for industrialization, at least three proof: One, UK developed the world’s first coal plant in 1882 and coal powered UK, then Germany, US, other countries to fast industrialization. Two, total world coal generation keeps rising from 3,748 terawatt-hours (TWH) in 1985 to 7,361 TWH in 2005 and 10,613 TWH in 2024. And three, China’s great leap from poverty to industrialization was largely powered by coal, only 261 TWH in 1985 to 1,980 TWH in 2005 and 5,828 TWH in 2024 (55 percent of world total).

With this background, I can think of four Philippine conglomerates with high energy footprints.

First, Meralco and its power generation subsidiary, Meralco PowerGen Corp. (MGen). They have a diverse portfolio from thermal (coal and gas) to renewables. I checked the MGen website, they have a total of 1,389 MW of coal capacity, thousand plus MW in gas plants, and several hundreds MW of solar.

Just last week, MGen received many awards and recognition at the 2025 Asian Power Awards held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The four awards are: CEO of the Year for MGen president and CEO Emmanuel Rubio; Power Plant Upgrade of the Year for its Baras Solar project in Rizal; Fast-Track Power Plant of the Year (Gold) and Power Plant Upgrade of the Year, for Singapore-based subsidiary, PacificLight Power Pte Ltd (PLP).