Wednesday, April 09, 2008 Hedcor says hydro plant won't pollute river water By Grace L. Plata
THE quality and quantity of Davao City's water supply will not be compromised if Hedcor's proposed hydroelectric plants in the third district were approved.
Hedcor president and chief executive officer Rene Ronquillo explained during Tuesday's regular session of the City Council that they would be constructing small, run-off river hydro plants with small dams that will not impound water.
"The dams are usually about five meters high. It diverts water into the system to make the turbines move to generate electricity but from the plants, it goes back into the river. Since the dam is small, the water will just flow above it when the river water is high," Ronquillo said.
He added that aside from needing only the water pressure, the hydro plant will gather the silt from it, thus the water being returned to the river is clean.
Environmental damages, Ronquillo said, are relatively zero during the operation of the power plant. However, he said it is during the construction of the plant that there will be damages.
He said aside from noise and air pollution due to equipment use during the construction, there is water pollution too as the water will be murky during the placement of the plant foundation. Domestic garbage from the workers there and trees will be cut to accommodate the pipeline. The existing road network will also be damaged due to the influx of construction equipment.
But Hedcor is committed to seeing through this project even with the impact of the construction, saying it might only be the way to address the projected energy crisis in 2010.
"We have no back-up sources anymore so we need to construct new ones. Hedcor will also employ mitigating measures to minimize the damage during construction," Ronquillo said.
The Hedcor executive also cited the good that the project will give the city including the payment of around P1.8 million in land rental for the three hydroelectric plants in Tamugan, Suawan and Panigan Rivers.
They will also be giving 1 cent per kilowatt-hour consumed to the Department of Energy (DOE), which the local government units (LGUs) can avail for electrification projects aside from the real property and business taxes paid to the city.
"We also signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) with the affected indigenous people in the area. Aside from non-monetary benefits, we will be giving them .15 cents per kilowatt-hour generated. The barangay also gets 1 cent per kwh (kilowatt hour)," Ronquillo said.
In a separate interview, Ronquillo said they are aware of the Davao City Water District's (DCWD's) opposition and are set to meet soon to discuss the matter.
"We do not think it is a problem. We are planning to have the plants at 305-meter elevation. DCWD's planned reservoir is just at 90-110 meter elevation. Actually it will save them about a hundred million pesos if we are there because they can just tap on our pipeline. They will even get better and cleaner water if they do," Ronquillo said.
He explained that the area where DCWD plans to build its reservoir is below the banana plantation while Hedcor will utilize an area above it. Thus, if DCWD taps Hedcros pipeline, it will get cleaner water.
"The plant will release about 10 cubic meters of water per second and DCWD requires only four cubic meters. We can be actually be beneficial to them," Ronquillo said.
