CEBU, Philippines - American company Quantum International has expressed interest to pour in at least US$450 million in capital expenditure to invest in Cebu’s fertile energy sector.
“We understand that Cebu and the rest of the Visayas is in need of more power generation plants and we are willing to set up our gasification plants as one of our major industrial projects here,” said Al Johnson, president and chief executive officer and director for operations of Quantum International.
Johnson was in Cebu recently to announce the company’s plan, as well as start talking with concerned government agencies, such as the Cebu Provincial Government and other Local Government Units (LGUs) for possible joint venture agreements to put up a plasma facility here.
"We fund, build, own and operate each of our facilities,” Johnson said, stressing that the project would entail no direct cost from the government,” he said.
Quantum started with the thermal transformation of waste to produce a clean combustible gas referred to as “Fuel Gas”.
The Fuel Gas is used to produce electricity in a combined cycle gas/steam turbine. Likewise, it can also be used to produce ethanol (denatured ethyl alcohol), a fuel that can either be blended with gasoline or burned in an engine as a neat fuel.
Heat generated by the process is used to produce electricity, superheat steam, heal-boiler feed-water and to distill.
“The idea here is to help Cebu eliminate its municipal waste by producing electricity and commercial products out of it, which can then be sold at the market,” he said.
The plasma gasification can turn one ton of garbage into one megawatt of electricity.
With an estimated of 2,000 tons of garbage collected in the cities of Cebu, Lapu-Lapu and Mandaue, this would translate to 2,000 megawatts of electricity, he said.
The facility, which Quantum International hopes to build this year, will employ at least 400 workers and 100 engineers over an 18-month construction period.
When plasma gasification is fully developed, even existing landfills could be economically mined for energy production, environmental cleanup and land reuse.
Johnson added that the initiative, also aims to reduce electricity costs in the country.
“The facility will be 20 percent cheaper than other renewable energy sources and electricity cost here will go down from $0.20 centavos to $US0.10 centavos per kilowatt hour," he stressed.
Johnson revealed about five gasification plants are being eyed in the Philippines including one in Cebu, where four of the plants will be located in Manila “in areas where there are acute problems on waste.”
Quantum International is a US-based company headquartered in Houston, Texas.
It is the holding company of Quantum Cebu Financial Management Inc. (Quantum Cebu), a new Philippine corporation that would handle the promotion of projects such as biofuels, plasma, and advanced building systems in the country. (FREEMAN)
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