BOHOL stands to get a minimum of three more megawatts of self-generated power soon.
This, Rep. Erico Aristotle Aumentado (Bohol, 2nd District) said, after Secretary Francis Pangilinan, Presidential Assistant for Food Security and Agricultural Modernization, instructed Administrator Florencio Padernal of the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) to schedule the bidding for the hydroelectric plant in Bayongan Dam in San Miguel town the soonest possible time.
Aumentado said the move will boost locally-generated power so that Bohol will not suffer that much should the Leyte-Bohol Interconnection Project (LBIP) encounters trouble or undergoes preventive maintenance servicing (PMS).
He said hydroelectric power is clean, that is, non-polluting, and renewable. It goes along well with the preservation of the environment and promotion of agriculture that are the province’s top tourist draws established by his predecessor and namesake father, Erico Boyles Aumentado.
The elder Aumentado who was governor at the time, had steered Bohol to become the country’s top tourist destination during the incumbency of then Tourism Secretary Richard Gordon.
The solon had been picking up the pieces of the projects of his father left unfinished because of his untimely demise on Christmas Day of 2012. The late governor had brought the submarine cable technology to Bohol, tapping the Tongonan Geothermal Power Plant in Leyte as source.
Pangilinan and Padernal met again the other day to fine tune the requirements in the run up to the bidding. LBIP was the brainchild of the late solon and governor. At the same time, he had been pushing for more locally generated power that is now the focus of his son.
The younger Aumentado said a hydroelectric plant within the dam is not too enormous work. Turbines will be installed where the water drops as it overflows from the impounding dam. The force will power the turbines to generate power.
The solon expressed elation as he became one step closer to the realization of his father’s – and his dream.
Despite his being a neophyte politician, and young at that – he has persuaded top government officials to help him improve the Boholanos’ lives. (By JUNE S. BLANCO)