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BY HERBERT VEGO
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SENATOR Joel Villanueva vaguely cited “environmental concern” as the reason why he is not fully happy with the Tax Reform for Acceleration Inclusion (TRAIN) law that would hike excise taxes on, among others, local coal from the present P10 per cubic meter to P50 in the year 2018, P100 in 2019 and finally P150 in 2020 and beyond.
Senators Villanueva, Loren Legarda and Juan Miguel Zubiri had proposed a bigger P300 excise tax for coal.
Villanueva had proposed that the 12 percent value-added tax (VAT) be imposed as well on coal, including local coal solely produced by Semirara Mining and Power Corporation (SMPC) in Semirara, Caluya, Antique. Local coal comprises 40 percent of the total coal used by coal-fired power plants in the Philippines.
On seeing his VAT proposal scrapped by the bicameral conference committee and therefore missing in the TRAIN law as signed by President Rodrigo Duterte, Villanueva hollered, “Dapat maisama ‘yan at hindi tayo papayag na hindi kasama yan.”
Like Senators Legarda and Zubiri, he would work for an amendment to subject coal to VAT in the next phase of the TRAIN measure within the year. Reason cited: to prod power consumers to patronize cleaner sources of energy.
Incidentally, Legarda’s 24-year-old son, Leandro Leviste, runs Solar Philippines. It’s a private company engaged in installing solar panels on rooftops. Well and good, while it complies with the “Renewable Energy Act,” it is still beyond the reach of low- and middle-income power consumers.
There is no sense, however, in discrediting coal – which is still the cheapest local source of energy – to promote solar power. Coal as used to run modern-day power plants does not violate the “Clean Air Act” despite allegations that it is dirty and hazardous to health.
Semirara Island as coal receptacle has made Caluya the highest-income municipality of the province, earning half a billion pesos annually. Without that coal flooding the export and local markets, Antique could have remained one of the top 20 poorest provinces of the Philippines.
The coal-fired power plants in the Philippines do not spew black smoke. They utilize the “circulating fluidized bed technology” that depends on electrostatic precipitators that trap ashes, mercury, particulate matters, sulfur oxides, nitrogen oxides and other gases, preventing them from being released into the atmosphere.
If there’s anything wrong with the “Clean Air Act,” it’s its provision banning the use of incinerators in garbage disposal. In Japan, the government allows high-tech incinerators because they efficiently turn garbage into dust without belching poisonous gasses.
The “Renewable Energy Act” is as useless. To this day, there is not enough all-season source of renewable energy in the Philippines. And while solar energy is available, the functional technology does not allow cheaper installation and utilization.
Methinks Senator Legarda, author of the “Climate Change Act of 2009” (Republic Act 9729), should have scratched her head instead over the failure of the said law to curb or minimize the hazards of extreme weather change. The law is supposed to punish people who cut forest trees, clog the waterways and pollute air and water. But we don’t see them arrested and jailed.
Back to Villanueva’s stance on imposing VAT on coal, that would jack up the financial burden that the power producers would bill commercial and residential electricity users.
As I said in a previous column, the only way to fend off the consequential price increases of prime commodities is to earn much more. Unfortunately, only the military and police forces would be paid double their present salary. (hvego31@gmail.com /PN)
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