Aboitiz group is highest bidder for Ambuklao-Binga hydro plants

(Updated 3:52 p.m.) SN Aboitiz Power Hydro Inc. has offered $325 million for the 75-megawatt Ambuklao and 100-MW Binga hydroelectric power plants, emerging as the highest bidder in Wednesday's auction. The consortium beat out Calaca Power, a unit of US energy firm AES Corp., which submitted a $305.05 million bid for the facilities. Lopez-led First Gen Hydropower Corp. did not submit an offer. The country’s first and second hydroelectric power plants, respectively, the Ambuklao-Binga power facilities complexes run along the upper portion of Luzon’s longest waterway, the Agno River. Binga, which is located in Itogon, Benguet, lies 19 kilometers downstream of the Ambuklao plant in the Bokod town of the same province. One of the responsibilities of the winning bidder is to rehabilitate the Ambuklao hydro plant and make it operational to 65 MW, minimum, within a period of seven years from the date of turnover. Based on the recommendation of the National Power Corp. and the preference of the bidders, power supply contracts will not be attached to the sale of the Ambuklao-Binga complex. This is because the hydropower plants operate only when there is a sufficient amount of water in its reservoirs. In this case, a power supply contract may not be advantageous to the prospective owner, as it may find it difficult meeting the projected contract level assigned in the supply contract. - GMANews.TV