Philippines’ First Gen, Sinar Mas To Develop Over $2 Billion Of Geothermal Projects In Indonesia

An integrated geothermal complex owned and operated by First Gen’s EDC in the Philippines.

Courtesy of First Gen

Sinar Mas—controlled by tycoon Franky Widjaja and his family—has partnered with Philippine tycoon Federico Lopez’s First Gen Corp. to build six geothermal power plants with a combined capacity of 440 megawatts in Indonesia.

The projects would entail about $2.2 billion in investments, or $500 million for every 100MW of installed capacity, a person familiar with the venture told Forbes Asia. The estimate includes drilling and other subsurface investments for the steam fields, and the power plants, the source said.

Sinar Mas unit PT DSSR Daya Mas Sakti and PT First Gen Geothermal Indonesia, a unit of Manila-based First Gen, plan to develop six fields in West Java, Flores, Jambi, West Sumatra and Central Sulawesi, the partners said in a joint statement.

Indonesia holds around 40% of the world’s geothermal reserves but only 10% has been developed, providing the archipelago a large untapped resource to fuel its clean energy transition goal.

“Our goal is to strengthen national capacity in geothermal development and to fully harness the country’s natural potential for clean energy,” DSSR President Daya Mas Sakti Lokita Prasetya said in the statement.

First Gen’s unit Energy Development Corp. (EDC)— which owns and operates 13 integrated geothermal power stations across the Philippines with a combined installed capacity of 1,189MW—will spearhead the geothermal project in Indonesia.

Philippine-listed First Gen is reviving its international ambitions more than a decade since EDC first ventured overseas. In 2011, EDC entered Chile to explore potential geothermal sites but it has yet to build a facility in the country.

First Gen is pushing forward with expansion plans after agreeing to sell 60% of its stake in gas assets to Philippine casino-to-ports billionaire Enrique Razon Jr. for 50 billion pesos ($875 million). It’s investing $9 billion to quadruple its renewable energy capacity to 13 gigawatts by 2030.

Apart from gas, which provides 55% of First Gen’s capacity, and geothermal, the Philippine company’s energy portfolio includes hydro, solar and wind.

With a net worth of $18.9 billion, the Widjaja family ranked No. 4 on Forbes’ list of Indonesia’s 50 Richest that was published in December 2024. Besides energy, the family’s Sinar Mas group has interests in agribusiness, in mining, paper mills, financial services, real estate, and telecommunications.

The Lopez family, which has a net worth of $285 million, is the controlling shareholder of ABS-CBN, once the country’s largest broadcaster. It pivoted to online streaming and content sharing with other networks after Philippine lawmakers in 2020 rejected the media company’s bid to renew its franchise.