Meralco to sign agreement with US nuclear firm
By Alena Mae S. Flores – November 7, 2023, 7:20 pm
from manilastandard.net
Power retailer Manila Electric Co. expects to sign a cooperation agreement with US nuclear firm Ultra Safe Nuclear Corp. next week during the US trip of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
This followed the conclusion of Meralco’s three-month pre-feasibility agreement with Ultra Safe which was signed in September.
“The cooperation agreement between Meralco and USNC (Ultra Safe) is about be signed and it will be formalized during the state visit of the President to the US next week,” Meralco executive vice president and chief operating officer Ronnie Aperocho said.
Aperocho said Meralco would have opportunity to see Ultra Safe’s working nuclear system in one of the campuses of the University of Illinois in the US.
“We’re bullish about their technology and part of the areas we talked to them about is Meralco procuring a proof of concept plan that they can build here in the Philippines that’s safe. I think that’s part of the discussion of the US visit,” Meralco chairman Manuel Pangilinan said.
He said Meralco does not have the experience in terms of building and running a modular nuclear plant.
Pangilinan earlier said the feasibility study would take another six months after the three-month pre-feasibility study.
He vowed to share the results of the study with the government which would involve the nuclear siting, cost, safety, among others.
Meralco is exploring a micro modular reactor option for the Philippines.
Pangilinan said MMRs have a capacity of 5 MW to 15 MW that could be ideal for hyperscalers and data centers which need reliable power supply.
He said Meralco also started talks with academic institutions to boost the Filipinos’ technical knowledge on nuclear under the company’s Filipino Scholars and Interns on Nuclear Engineering (FISSION) program.
He earlier said Meralco would invest in local talents and support aspiring Filipino nuclear engineers to help accelerate the development of the country’s technical and regulatory talent pipeline through education and training in the highly specialized field of nuclear engineering.
“Meralco will send some of our engineers to a two-year graduate program targeting local talents who are graduates and practicing Mechanical, Electrical, Material Engineering, and related areas in universities in the US, in Canada, Korea, Japan, France,” he said.
