NorthPoint seeks loan for $100-million power project

MANILA, Philippines - NorthPoint Wind Power Corp. is planning to negotiate with domestic banks and other financial institutions to fund its proposed wind farm power plant in Aparri, Cagayan.

“We are open to holding talks with Banco de Oro Unibank Inc. (BDO), the Metropolitan Bank & Trust Co. (Metrobank) or Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI),” Northwind Power Development Corp. chairman Fernando A. Dumlao said in a presentation at the World Bank yesterday.

NorthPoint Wind is a spin-off of Northwind Power, the operator of the Bangui Bay wind power project in Ilocos Norte.

Dumlao added that they are likewise eyeing to hold talks with government financial institutions such as the Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP) and Lank Bank of the Philippines (LBP).

The project is estimated to cost nearly $100 million.

Dumlao added they would likely take advantage of the incentives offered by the recently passed Renewable Energy Act, such as the seven-year reduction of the corporate tax from 30 percent to just 10 percent.

The wind power energy proponent is likewise upbeat on the prospect of gaining carbon credits from the Aparri wind projects.

The Bangui Bay wind farm is the first Philippine project that has availed of the clean development mechanism (CDM) in the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, which allows a project based in a developing country to sell its emission reductions to a company based in, or the government of an industrialized country.

The Bangui Bay project earned more than $100,000 in carbon credits in 2006 and 2007.

Dumlao said it would continue to earn credits in the succeeding years that may be twice what it the project earned so far.

The first two credits were priced at $4.25 for every certified emission reductions or CERs. The latest rate has gone up to 10 to 12 euros per CER.

He said the Aparri wind project would hopefully be able to also take advantage of the carbon credits, which it can convert into earnings or trade to interested parties.

Developed countries are usually the buyers of carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol. But lately, there have been brokers of carbon credits who trade these like commodities.

“It is a multi-million dollar international business that favors the protection of the environment,” the World Bank said. The World Bank assisted Northwind Power in getting accredition from the United National Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) under the Kyoto Protocol.