Transition from energy poverty to energy abundance and the OIEA
ENERGY, INFRA AND ECONOMICS - Bienvenido Oplas Jr. - The Philippine Star
May 28, 2026
Last Tuesday, May 26, I attended the Economic Journalists Association of the Philippines (EJAP) forum on the theme, “Beyond the Crisis: Defining a New Era of Philippine Energy” held at Frabelle Corporate Plaza, Makati. I am not a member of EJAP but the leaders gave me permission to attend, my gratitude to them.
After the welcome message by EJAP president Ted Cordero, the keynote address was given via video by Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Sharon Garin, followed by her prepared speech read by DOE Undersecretary Felix William “Wimpy” Fuentebella. Then another video message from Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) chairman and CEO Francis Saturnino “Nino” Juan.
Sec Sharon and Usec Wimpy highlighted the practical dictum that energy security is national security, diversified power sources and more reliance on indigenous energy reduces the risks from high import fuel dependence. Chair Nino mentioned one of my non-friendly topics, electricity price control via the secondary price cap at WESM. Because price control is price dictatorship and he correctly noted that the price cap has become the destination instead of “circuit breaker” during hours of thin power margins.
I am no fan of DOE’s so many gigawatts (GW) of green energy auction (GEA) for solar-wind with no battery, especially offshore wind that are very costly in both generation and transmission system. We need another round of auction, a baseload energy auction (BEA) that should run parallel to GEA at similar level of GW.
Then a panel discussion with six speakers: Usec Wimpy, ERC director Sharon Montaner, MGEN Renewables president and CEO Dennis Jordan, Prime CoreGen president and CEO Jose Victor Emmanuel “Jocot” de Dios, Divina Law Offices senior partner Jose “Jay” Layug Jr., and Aboitiz Power vice president for corporate affairs Ronald Francis “Suiee” Suarez. The moderator was The STAR business editor and columnist Iris Gonzales, my editor in this column.
All of them have the unanimous view that we need to expand power generation to address power shortages. Even Jay Layug who champions heavy RE use in our power system concedes the need for additional baseload. Jocot spoke about developing more indigenous gas and I agree with him, hydrocarbons are beautiful not only for liquid fuel and power generation but also for various petrochem, fertilizers production.
Dennis spoke naturally about MTerra Solar, the largest project of his company. This kind of solar project I can support because it has battery, an extensive storage system and removes the “duck curve” at noontime. But I wish that MGEN Thermal president Lino Bernardo was also there to talk about the larger beauty of thermal plants, spinning machines that can run 24/7 with inertia and high energy density.
Suiee mentioned that they have allotted high capex this year for RE but he also highlighted that their conventional plants, both thermal and renewable – coal, gas, geothermal, hydro – play a big role in helping ensure energy security of the country.
During the Q&A, I was the last to ask a question and I asked Usec Wimpy – Why not change the concept of energy transition from energy poverty to energy abundance? The kwh per capita generation, the Philippines has 1,100, Vietnam has nearly 3,000, Singapore has 9,000, South Korea has 12,000. We are in a state of energy poverty and energy transition from fossil fuels to variable RE is the least relevant for us.
Usec Wimpy agreed but he insisted on aligning DOE policies with the energy trilemma – energy security, affordability and sustainability.
Energy abundance. I checked the web if there is already an “energy abundance index”, there is none. There is the “Simon Abundance Index” (SAI) developed by “Human Progress” project of Cato Institute in the US but it is focused on the relationship between resource abundance and population, and energy is only one of many factors.
So I will introduce an informal concept that may be called the Oplas Index of Energy Abundance (OIEA, pronounced like “Oh yeah”). I computed the electricity generation per person of countries as: Total generation in gigawatt-hours (GWh) divided by population in million equals kWh per capita. Then set a threshold of 1,500 kWh per capita, 1,499 or below is energy poverty.
The corresponding threshold in GDP per capita at purchasing power parity (PPP) value is roughly $15,000 and in GDP at current value is around $4,500. But I will expand on this in future elaboration of the index.
Data sources, for total generation, Energy Institute, Statistical Review of World Energy 2025; population and GDP size, IMF, World Economic Outlook 2026. I start with Asia-Pacific countries first and here are the numbers of power generation in 2024:
(a) Energy abundance, 5,001 and above kWh per capita: Hong Kong 5,203; Malaysia 6,381, China 7,163; Japan 8,204; New Zealand 8,510; Singapore 9,875; Australia 10,283; South Korea 12,085; Taiwan 12,332.
(b) Energy affluence, 1,500 to 5,000 kWh per capita: Thailand 2,784; Vietnam 2,997.
(c) Energy poverty, below 1,500 kWh per capita: India 1,400; Indonesia 1,332; Philippines 1,151; Cambodia 1,016; Sri Lanka 863; Bangladesh 624; Pakistan 567; Myanmar 396.
Our 1,150 kWh per capita is what Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, Taiwan attained in the 70s; Australia and Japan attained in the 60s or 50s; Malaysia in 1988, Thailand in 1997, China in 2001 and Vietnam in 2011. I will show the tables and computations in my column in BusinessWorld next week.
So there. We should go for energy abundance and not wallow in energy poverty. Go for energy agnosticism and not favoritism (priority and mandatory dispatch for RE). Go for targeting say 1,600 kWh per capita by 2030, 2,500 by 2040 and 4,000+ by 2050. Instead of targeting 50 percent RE by 2050.
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