Renewable Energy Business

The Company’s main income is from the operation of renewable energy business by producing and distributing electricity from 7 solar farms in Thailand and 2 solar farms in Japan with total capacity of 50 megawatts under PDI Energy Group, a subsidiary of the Company. In 2020, the operation of all solar farm power plants in the Group continued smoothly with their maximum efficiency under the international standard quality management system, ISO 9001. In the past year, all solar farms of the Company Group in Thailand have already passed the international standard system certification. Besides, the Company also emphasized on supervision of power plant operations and machinery maintenance under regular schedule. As a result, the power plants produces electricity at approximately 70 million kilowatt-hours (kWh), close to the previous year’s production, which are able to reduce overall costs as planned.

Although the renewable energy business shows good performance and generate consistent cash flow with stable rate of return for the Company, growing has been difficult as there have been no new Power Purchase Agreements (PPA) issued. Growing would therefore be limited to acquisitions, or doing private PPA which are small in scale. Heavy competition in the market has led to prices of existing assets increasing dramatically, reducing the expected returns from investing in such projects. With the total electricity generating capacity of 50 MW power plants, the Company is only a small power producer and has higher financial costs than other competitors. In addition, revenue from solar farms tends to decline automatically because of the deterioration of solar panels, which caused lower income. Moreover, the Adder of PPA and BOI tax exemption benefits will be gradually expired in the next few years. Therefore, the Company has to review the investment policy in renewable energy business, decide to downsize the renewable energy business by selling all Thai solar farms and focus on the hospitality business which notably shows a continuous growth rate and long-term stability.

At the end of 2020, the Company has successfully negotiated plans to sell their all Thai 36.3 megawatts solar farms at the price of 1,704.67 million Baht to BAFS Clean Energy Corporation Company Limited or BC, a subsidiary of Bangkok Aviation Fuel Services Public Company Limited by allocating investment in ATC Enviro Company Limited (ATCE), PDI Mae Ramat Company Limited (PDIMR) and P.P. Solar (Nong-No) Company Limited (PPS), which are all subsidiaries of PDI Energy Company Limited (PDIE). This selling price reflects reasonable future returns that the Company would get at that time.

The Company operates the production and maintenance for all 7 power plants with the highest efficiency under a professional team and ISO international standard. Apart from selling those 3 companies, their employees will be transferred to work in BAFS Clean Energy Corporation as well.

As for the other two solar farms in Japan, the 2.27 MW Nanao Solar Farm and the 10.73 MW Nogata Solar Farm, they are in the selling plan and further negotiations with some investors.  The incomes from the solar farm power plant disposal will be used for investing in the hotel business and others.

Nanao

  • Nanao 2.27 MW

Nogata

  • Nogata 11 MW

PDI Asia Solar

  • 2.27 MW Nanao Solar Farm: This project started commercial operations in October 2016, and is currently producing 10% above the initial target.
  • 10.73 MW Nogata Solar Farm: This project finalized construction late 2017, with a commercial operation date on March 1, 2018.