Oil and gas major TotalEnergies and Philippines-based renewable energy developer Nextnorth have reached financial close on, and started construction at, a 440MW solar PV project in the Philippines.
The project is under construction in the City of Ilagan, in the north of Luzon, the Philippines’ northernmost island. TotalEnergies owns 65% of the project, with the remainder owned by Nextnorth, and the companies expect to start commercial operations at the project by the end of next year.
Try Premium for just $1
- Full premium access for the first month at only $1
- Converts to an annual rate after 30 days unless cancelled
- Cancel anytime during the trial period
Premium Benefits
- Expert industry analysis and interviews
- Digital access to PV Tech Power journal
- Exclusive event discounts
Or get the full Premium subscription right away
Or continue reading this article for free
The owners noted that they have offtake agreements in place to sell half of the power generated at the project to a combination of AdventEnergy, PrimeRES and two retail electricity suppliers; they plan to sell the remaining production to the Philippines national grid.
The total project costs sit at US$300 million, and project financing, which was secured this week, comes from three banks: the Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, ING Bank and Standard Chartered, which are headquartered in Japan, the Netherlands and the UK, respectively. TotalEnergies claimed that the project is “the largest international financing” for a Philippines solar project to date.
“Energy security has never been more relevant for the Philippines than it is today,” said Nextnorth president and CEO Miguel Mapa, highlighting the role that renewable energy can play in delivering energy security. “With rising demand and continued exposure to imported fuels, the country needs domestic, scalable and bankable renewable capacity.”
The Philippines has experienced considerable upheaval in its energy supplies since the outbreak of the conflict in the Middle East, as it is a net importer of energy, with fossil fuel supplies from the Middle East a cornerstone of its energy mix. According to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC), he country imported crude petroleum oils worth US$3.7 billion in 2024, and US$1.79 billion of this came from Saudi Arabia, with US$474 million coming from Iraq.
The disruption to the global oil and gas trade has therefore had a significant impact on the Philippines, which declared a state of emergency last month over concerns about meeting its electricity demand; figures from the country’s Department of Energy show that, without foreign imports, it would have enough natural gas to meet its own demand for just over 23 days.
Part of this declaration of a state of emergency included the fast-tracking of 1.4GW of new renewable energy capacity, of which 12 are solar PV projects with a cumulative capacity of 1.3GW. In the wake of the start of the conflict, PV Tech Premium heard from Gaurav Purohit, vice president of European asset finance at global credit rating agency, Morningstar DBRS, about how the crisis could encourage more investments into solar power, and ultimately to be of “benefit” to utility-scale solar generators.
