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Solar power generation will get a boost once the government has put in place the mechanism for setting the rates of renewable energy

"The declining cost of solar panels, brought about by the introduction of feed-in tariff in European countries, has pushed the price of solar panels downward. As soon as the same incentive is offered to solar energy producers in the Philippines, installations of solar power plants will soar from 1MW to 50MW in less than a year," the industry group Philippine Solar Power Alliance said.

Tetchi Capellan, one of the country’s solar power pioneers and chief of party of the Alliance for Mindanao Off-grid Renewable Energy (Amore) said solar power output could rise to 300 megawatts in three years, making the country one of the largest producers of solar power in the region.

"The installed cost for a utility-scale ground-mounted 30MW solar plant in the Philippines is about P2.56 per kwh. The cost becomes a bit more expensive for roof-top mounted, or building-integrated solar power plants," she said.

"Owing to the high sun irradiation found in a tropical country like the Philippines, the targeted installation throughout the country in the next three years is projected at about 300MW. This number of solar plants, as well as the presence of the world’s largest solar panel manufacturer in Laguna, will make the Philippines a solar hub in Southeast Asia," she added.

Regulators are now readying the proposed feed-in tariffs (FITs). These are the guaranteed price renewable energy developers will be paid for the energy that they will produce and inject to the transmission or distribution system.

The FITs will be paid by consumers through a uniform per kilowatt-hour charge to be known as the FIT Allowance (FIT-All), the implementation of which is similar to that of the current Universal Charge.

This FIT-All in turn will be established and set by the ERC on an annual basis upon petition by the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP), which is tasked with the settlement and payment to eligible renewable energy plants.

PSPA said production of solar panels is the fastest rising technology in the global scene, with 48 percent annual growth, while cost of plant installation has been dropping significantly in the last eight years. In Europe, it is projected that before 2020, solar power cost will be the same as grid prices.

PSPA was founded by Capellan and Ramon Abaya.

Capellan’s Intensity Inc. has installed the biggest number of solar home systems in off-grid Mindanao under the funding umbrella of US Agency for International Development.

Abaya’s Cepalco owns and operates the only standing 1MW solar plant in Cagayan de Oro.

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