Local execs back coal power plant in Palawan amid protests

PUERTO PRINCESA CITY—The proposed coal-fired power plant set to be constructed in Aborlan, Palawan, received its crucial endorsement from the municipal government on Tuesday despite stiff opposition from local residents.

The 15-megawatt plant is to be built by DMCI Powers to supply the main power grid of mainland Palawan under a 15-year power-supply agreement with the local distribution cooperative, the Palawan Electric Cooperative.

Under its contract, DMCI is seeking to construct two coal-fired powered plants that will generate a total of 25 megawatts of electricity and will be fed by the company’s own Semirara coal from the province of Antique.

Angry protests

Opposition to the plant has been stiff, with local residents angrily protesting the project, along with a state university with a student population of about 2,000 students, whose campus is located beside the planned power plant site.

DMCI, however, has banked on the support of local political leaders to secure its permits.

The Palawan Alliance for Clean Energy (PACE), a multisectoral group formed to oppose the project, claimed that the municipal government of Aborlan “violated established procedures” in conducting local consultations as part of the local process in granting permits to environmentally sensitive projects.

“The municipal endorsement is flawed because there was never any proper consultation conducted. And all the related gatherings that tackled the issue have shown that the residents of Aborlan are opposed to this project,” said lawyer Gidor Manero of PACE.

Mockery

Manero claimed that the local government of Aborlan “tricked” the anticoal groups into believing that the project would undergo continued deliberations in the committee level but convened a “special session” to pass a resolution endorsing the project after leaders of PACE left the session hall.

Marlene Jagmis, a leader of the local opposition, in her social network blog, complained that the local officials of Aborlan “made a mockery of the law.”

Henry Alcalde, DMCI vice president, dismissed the protests of nongovernment organizations (NGOs), claiming that local officials had studied the proposal before they issued the endorsement.

“They made their own study by visiting the actual coal plant site, secured articles about the coal plant and discovered for themselves that what the NGOs were saying were half-truths,” Alcalde told the Inquirer in a text message.

The proposed plant is to be located in Barangay San Juan, where it is being supported by officials who visited a similar plant in Iloilo upon the invitation of DMCI.