THE NATIONAL POWER CORPORATION (NAPOCOR) of the Philippines said that it expects the 345MW San Roque hydro station to start operating three years ahead of schedule. Napocor’s president and chief executive officer Roland Quilala said that the plant would be commissioned in December 2002.

San Roque, which is scheduled for completion in January 2005, is being built as a build-operate-transfer scheme with Marubeni Corporation of Japan as contractor. Quilala said that all the right-of-way issues surrounding the project had been confronted and resolved quickly.