CLARK FREEPORT – Energy Sec. Jose Rena Almendras has appealed to local government executives to submit a list of beneficiaries of loans for electric tricycles (E-trikes) in their areas in time for the March 31 deadline set by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
“I am just waiting for local government units to submit to me (the number of beneficiaries of electric tricycles),” Almendras said at a press conference during an energy forum held here recently.
He said the ADB has set the deadline on March 31 for the list to determine how much Clean Technology Fund it could allocate for the environment-friendly project. The World Bank, he noted, is also providing funds.
Almendras noted that the tricycles are expected to remain as a major means of transportation for majority of rural folk in the provinces and that making them run on chargeable electric batteries would be environment-friendly and also save them fuel cost.
“The cost will depend on the list to be submitted by the local governments. We have perfected the model (for the electric tricycles),” Almendras said.
He estimated that each electric tricycle or E-trike would cost about P180,000 to P200,000 “depending on the size of the batteries.”
“We have asked the LGU’s to decide and we will provide the money, structure and system – how to loan out and system for daily collection (of amortizations),” he said.
He said that the amortization cost would be about P200 to P300 daily which, he noted, is the “boundary cost” shouldered by tricycle drivers who merely rent their tricycles.
Under the government plan, the E-trikes would be owned by the beneficiaries in five years.
Last year, the DOE already introduced about 20,000 electric tricycles, or 10 percent of the total number of registered tricycles in Metro Manila.
The project was meant to save about 100,000 liters of imported oil daily, with an annual savings of $36.5 million.
The DOE has been working closely with the ADB in developing a national electric vehicle strategy.
While the strategy is being developed, DOE has started introducing electric tricycles and jeepneys working closely with local entrepreneurs and technical experts.
The DOE project would need total investments of about $1 billion over the next five to seven years, which will be mobilized by ADB and other multilateral investors, including $125 million from the Clean Technology Fund.
