Mitigating Climate Change

MITIGATING CLIMATE CHANGE

By Anton Antonio

December 1, 2015

I really do not know if this is by design or just providential.  The first days of the month this year seems to trigger my mind to publish and blog about coal.  On June 1, 2015, I blogged about “Coal Plant in Palawan” and exactly a month after (July 1, 2015), I again wrote the article titled “The Coal War in Palawan”.  Today, I inevitably will touch again on the proposed coal plants in Palawan.

The proponents in the establishment of a coal power plant in Palawan are projecting a helpless image that seems to give the impression that putting up a coal-powered plant in this island-province is the only alternative… that it has to be coal… that it’s coal or nothing.  Well, this was the situation some six months ago and they probably have not heard of the Cebu renewable energy initiative.

The Cebu initiative is all about a local company, SunAsia Energy, which is investing P5.6 billion that would establish one of the biggest solar farms in the Philippines.  The solar farm is located on a 70-hectare lot in Toledo City with a planned capacity of 60 megawatts (MW).  Scheduled to be operational by February 15, 2016, the solar plant is expected to generate an annual capacity of more than 861,000 megawatt hours.

The better part of the solar farm project and facility is the infrastructure where grass will be allowed to grow under and between some 5,000 arrays of solar panels.  This will function as grazing area where livestock could be raised.  The Toledo City power plant could help reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1.72 metric tons of carbon footprint in the next 20 years.  This, together with other solar farms and power plants that are being established in the country, should be a substantial contribution of the Philippines in mitigating climate change.

Thoughts to promote positive action…

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REFERENCES:

Antonio, A. C., (2015).  “Coal Plant in Palawan”. Retrieved on December 1, 2015 from http://antonantonio.blogspot.com/2015/06/coal-plant-in-palawan.html

Antonio, A. C., (2015).  “The Coal War in Palawan”. Retrieved on December 1, 2015 from

http://antonantonio.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-coal-war-in-palawan.html