DOE moves to hike renewables share

BY LENIE LECTURA, 9 Sep 2021

The Department of Energy (DOE) is formally adopting the recommendation of the National Renewable Energy Board (NREB) to increase the minimum level of electricity contracted from renewable energy (RE) developers to 2.52 percent from the current 1 percent.

In a draft circular on the prescribed adjusted annual percentage increment of the Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS), the DOE said “the RPS Composite Team resolved to recommend for the adoption of the adjusted minimum annual incremental RE percentage of 2.52 percent for planning period 2023-2040, as recommended by the NREB.”

The DOE is soliciting comments from industry stakeholders until September 10. The agency will hold a virtual public hearing on the same day.

“The adoption of the adjusted minimum annual incremental RE percentage of 2.52 percent starting 2023 is necessary to meet the aspirational RE share of at least 35 percent in the country’s energy mix by 2030 and achieve an even higher RE share by 2040,” the DOE draft circular read.

The target RE share by 2030 is expected to hit 36.96 percent and even higher by 2040 at 55.87 percent, data from the DOE showed.

The current mix is still dominated by fossil fuels at 54.6 percent, natural gas at 21.2 percent, RE at 20.8 percent and oil-based fuel at 3.5 percent.

NREB Chairman Monalisa Dimalanta is confident that the target numbers would be achieved.

“We will get to that 35 pecent RE share by 2030 and, in fact, exceed 40 percent and get all the way up to 50 percent by 2040 if there are certain policies that will be adopted to make sure that we get there,” she said.

One way to achieve this, she said, is to increase RE installations under the RPS policy. “In the public consultation that the DOE had two days ago, it already announced that some of these policies that we had recommended, they are adopting these policies. The first one, which is key, is really the increase in RPS percentage from 1 percent to 2.52 percent by 2023.”