PH, US commit to undertake urgent actions vs climate crisis

QUEZON CITY (PIA) -- Philippine President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. and United States President Joseph “Joe” Biden reaffirm their commitment to undertake urgent action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The leaders both recognized that the climate crisis poses an existential threat to the world, especially to vulnerable countries like the Philippines. Hence, they resolved to expand collaboration on renewable energy production. This is to accelerate the clean energy transition while bringing down energy costs and expanding energy access for families.

They also hailed the progress in negotiating a U.S.-PH civil nuclear cooperation agreement (“123 agreement”). The United States and the Philippines will also pursue a program of cooperation on wind, solar, and geothermal energy while enhancing cooperation on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the waste, road, and shipping sectors.

In connection, Oregon-based NuScale Power Corporation expressed its interest to invest an estimated amount of $6.5B to $7.5B to provide 430MW to the Philippines by 2031.

NuScale is a top nuclear energy firm based in the United States known for developing a small nuclear power system, described as safe, modular, and scalable. It is planning to conduct a study to locate a site in the Philippines.

President Marcos is hopeful that the support of NuScale would address the issue of the Philippine power supply.

Meanwhile, in support of the Philippines’ development of its electric vehicle ecosystem, President Marcos witnessed the signing of a memorandum of agreement (MOA) between Integrated Micro-Electronics Inc. (IMI) of the Ayala Group and California-based Zero Motorcycles on a partnership to manufacture electric motorcycles.

Under the partnership, the US-based firm will lead the way in setting up the first electronic vehicle (EV) motorcycle manufacturing site in the Philippines.

The IMI-ZERO operations are a pioneering activity for the Philippines for the assembly of an electric motorcycle platform. It is expected to employ 200 workers for its assembly line, from manufacturing, packing, and shipping 18,000 EVs per year.

Further, both leaders also resolved to expand cooperation on environmental protections, including enhanced domain awareness, marine conservation, and protecting coastal areas from environmental degradation.

President Biden and President Marcos pledged to promote increased cooperation and knowledge sharing between the United States and the Philippines through the Science and Technology Agreement (STA). They also welcomed US plans to establish an Open-RAN Interoperability Lab in Manila.

Lastly, underscoring the importance of enhancing and sustaining joint efforts in outer space activities, the leaders also welcome their countries’ plans to prioritize and strengthen bilateral space cooperation by convening their first bilateral Civil Space Dialogue this year.

The two leaders expressed utmost confidence that the special ties between their nations and their people will only grow stronger with time, as the United States and the Philippines continue to realize their shared vision of partnership, peace, and prosperity. (KSAA – PIA CPSD)