By Alena Mae S. Flores | Nov. 27, 2014
at 11:15pm [ manilastandardtoday.com ]
Imperial Homes Corp. said Thursday it
will build the country’s first solar-powered mass-housing community that will
reduce electricity rates by P1 per kilowatt-hour.
“We expect electricity rates to be at
least P1 per kWh lower,” IHC president and chief executive Emma Imperial told
reporters in a news briefing.
The solar-powered community called Via
Verde is composed of 1,000 mass-housing units in Santo Tomas, Batangas.
Via Verde is located on a
three-hectare property with a combination of row houses and two-bedroom
townhouses.
Each townhouse will have 500 watts of
solar panels
installed for free to enable buyers to
enjoy lower electricity rates through the lease-back program of Enfinity of
Belgium, Imperial’s partner in the project.
Imperial signed a joint venture with
Enfinity Group, a Belgian company that finances, builds, owns, operates and
maintains solar panels with operations in the United States.
Imperial said it would spend P600
million to construct the housing while Enfinity allocated $1 million for the
installation of the solar panels.
CBL Group, a UK-registered and
China-based company, will provide green panels for pre-fab and modular housing.
“These solar-powered homes will
dramatically reduce the cost of electricity and provide a greener environment
for our low-cost housing projects,” Imperial said.
The project aims to alleviate the
country’s backlog on mass housing currently pegged at three million as well as
help provide a greener solution against the worsening effects of climate
change.
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