Gas and Coal Economics, page-54

It is a good question what will happen now, whether with the ERC or with power plants not yet approved. Full CSP would be great from many perspectives but remember, coal vs LNG straight up is not going to produce awards for LNG, at least not in the baseload. In a well-designed auction for mid-cycle and peaking requirements, gas would be / should be the fuel of choice. But there have already been auctions in the Philippines, conducted by groups of ECs, in which the all-in cost of coal has come in at roughly the current marginal fuel cost of LNG. Those were at slightly lower coal prices than today, but you get he general idea that capital recovery is not assured absent contracts that specifically cover that. I suspect the drama is not over; no doubt Meralco and other companies are marshaling their forces, and ERC commissioners will no doubt be fighting their suspensions. And a battle where the core issue is the cost of generation is not necessarily good news for what is a high marginal cost generator, if it ever actually comes on-line.

Anybody other than me notice that PH just lost two foreign investors in the power sector with the sale of the AES/EGAT plant at Masinloc? And prior to that Denham sold out to Ayala; be interesting to see if Blackrock hangs in there, I think they own, through Sithe, a lot of Mariveles.