SunAsia Energy, a solar engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) firm will build 1.3 GW of floating solar PV (FPV) projects on the Laguna Lake, the largest lake in the Philippines.
The project will be implemented in partnership with its investment partner BlueLeaf Energy. It may be noted that SunAsia Energy was awarded the projects as the winning bidder of an auction by the Laguna Lake Development Authority (LLDA) for 10 blocks of lake surface totalling 1,000 hectares.
In a statement, BlueLeaf said that by signing the lake lease agreement the projects have secured tenurial rights like environmental compliance certificates. The construction is expected to begin in 2025 and operations are expected to begin gradually between 2026-2030.
“Land use is becoming a big issue for renewables, particularly for solar energy projects,” said SunAsia Energy in a press release.
“Currently, project developers are struggling to find land to locate the solar power plants. Most of the time, delays in solar energy projects are normally caused by the consolidation of properties and late issuances of land conversion permits. So, there is an incentive to build on water,” the release said.
The firm further said that the area to be used for the projects represents around 2% of the 90,000 hectare area of Laguna Lake. However, it said that, it would be bigger than the 1,000-MW project of ACEN Corp. which signed a renewable energy contract area utilization agreement with LLDA for 800 hectares also in Laguna Lake.
BlueLeaf, a subsidiary of Macquarie’s Green Investment Group and SunAsia originally announced their partnership in 2021, intending to develop 1.25GW of solar PV in the Philippines, the statement pointed out.
