Conventional power facilities will remain a backbone of the Philippines’ electricity system as the country scales up renewable energy (RE) deployment, Aboitiz Power Corp. said, highlighting the need to balance sustainability targets with reliability.

At the American Chamber of Commerce (AmCham) 8th Annual Energy Forum, Rolando Paulino, Chief Engineering & Projects Officer of AboitizPower’s Transition Business Group, stressed that coal and other baseload plants provide the stability needed to accommodate the intermittency of renewables.

“Conventional power provides the stability, flexibility, and reliability that will allow emerging technologies and cleaner sources to scale,” Paulino said.

“Without it, the transition risks being unbalanced and unable to meet the country’s growing demand.”

The Department of Energy (DOE), in its Philippine Energy Plan 2023–2050, projects electricity sales to quadruple from 91.3 terawatt-hours in 2022 to more than 400 terawatt-hours by 2050, expanding at an average of 5.49 percent annually.

Industry leaders at the forum agreed that while renewable energy will drive growth in the long term, conventional plants will continue to play a crucial role in ensuring grid stability.

“Conventional energy still has a strong role to play. And it will continue to play a very strong role in the future,” AmCham Energy Committee Chairman Frank Thiel said.

Black & Veatch Managing Director Yatin Premchand also cautioned on the challenges of moving too quickly away from traditional sources, noting: “The actual situation we see with respect to energy transition is that it's a lot harder than any of us imagined. It's not easy to go from convention to net zero.”

Paulino added that AboitizPower is focused not only on building new capacities but also on optimizing the performance of existing assets, which include GNPower Mariveles and GNPower Dinginin in Bataan, Therma Luzon in Quezon, Therma Visayas in Cebu, and Therma South in Davao.

The conference, which also featured DOE Undersecretary Sharon Garin and Senate Energy Committee Vice Chair Sherwin Gatchalian, underscored the alignment of government policy and private-sector strategy in navigating the country’s energy transition.