San Miguel edges closer to delivering 1 GW battery fleet in Philippines

The power arm of Philippines-based conglomerate San Miguel Corp. has unveiled a 50 MW BESS in Limay, Philippines, as part of its nationwide 1 GW/1 GWh rollout. The facility is one of 32 battery sites the group is building across the islands of Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. It expects to deliver all of the projects by the end of the year, according to a press release by Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the president of the Philippines.

“BESS technology will support our goal of generating 35% of our total energy requirements from renewables by 2030,” Marcos said at an inauguration ceremony last week.

San Miguel's battery storage portfolio started to take shape back in 2018, when it acquired the country’s first BESS project – the 10 MW Masinloc Power Plant. In January 2022, the conglomerate said it was ready to start operating an initial 690 MW of battery storage facilities, as part of a plan to deliver a 1 GW BESS fleet by the year's end.

The Philippine Star quoted San Miguel CEO Ramon S. Ang as saying that the company had already delivered 640 MW of projects, with the balance expected to be finished by December of this year.

“Government is working to avert a power crisis,” Ang said. “But we know it takes time to complete new power facilities. The BESS network is here already and it can provide immediate mitigation to the power crisis.”

San Miguel partnered with ABB Philippines, Fluence, and Wartsila and their engineering, procurement and construction contractors on the project. This week, Fluence confirmed that it has completed 570 MW of BESS projects for San Miguel. These projects provide critical grid-stability services throughout the national transmission network in the Philippines, including frequency response, reserve power, and voltage regulation.

“Over the next couple of years, we estimate the integration of up to 5000 MW of renewable power into the grid due largely to our BESS facilities,” said Ang.

At the inauguration ceremony, President Marcos vowed to extend substantial support to investors in the renewable energy space and streamline regulations at the national and local levels.

“We will improve the policy and regulatory framework for the renewable energy industry, especially for the ESS technology, to encourage the further development of our fledgling renewables industry,” he said.

Marcos added that his administration will continue working with San Miguel. He noted that the company has “other BESS projects in the pipeline, accounting for 95% of BOI-approved projects, with 2,000 MW total capacity distributed across the country …  I and the rest of the Filipino people look forward to the rollout of these projects in the near future.”