Group plans $80-M soap factory in Batangas

An $80-million soap manufacturing plant may soon rise in Batangas unless opponents of the project can show that the planned surfactant manufacturing facility will be harmful to the environment.

Proponents of the $80-million soap manufacturing plant include the Chempil Group of businessman Antonio Garcia.

However, according to Garcia, Chempil will only be a minority shareholder. While he did not reveal who would be the other shareholders, they reportedly include Taiwanese, Korean, Indonesian and Japanese firms. The controversy over the planned project involves its plan to use linear alkyl benzene or LAB.

LAB is a petroleum-based, biodegradable raw material used in the production of soap and detergents.

The Batangas plant is projected to produce 70 tons a year of LAB-based surfactants.

The production output of the plant would be earmarked 60 percent for the domestic market and 40 percent for export.

According to Jesus Arranza, president of the United Coconut Association of the Philippines (UCAP), LAB is not completely biodegradable. Arranza revealed that based on tests, LABs still leave a trace of petroleum in the water.

LAB, Arranza said, is predominantly used in Europe because most European countries have a disposal system which filters waste water before it is released into streams and rivers. Unfortunately, in the Philippines, Arranza warned, there are no such filter systems.

At the same time, Arranza said the use of LAB in soap manufacturing would violate Executive Order 259 which mandates that all soaps and detergents should contain 80 percent coco-based chemicals or coconut fatty alcohol (CFAs) which are friendly to the environment.

Garcia, on the other hand, argued that LAB is an allowed substitute for CFAs. What is highly polluting, Garcia explained, is hard alkyl benzene or HAB.