CONGLOMERATE San Miguel Corp. (SMC) said it will submit a $2-billion (about P100 billion) worth of unsolicited project proposal to the Duterte administration to construct a spillway that will help solve chronic flooding in Metro Manila.
San Miguel President and COO Ramon S. Ang said the company will have a partner in the project, but he declined to give further details.
“You know what caused the heavy flooding during Typhoon Ondoy in 2009? It’s because Laguna de Bay before was 20 meters deep. Now, it is just 2.5 meters because it is full of trash,” Ang said at the sidelines of the initial listing of Eagle Cement Corp., where he is also its chairman.
“We should have a spillway project that will release those huge quantities of water from the Laguna de Bay to Manila Bay,” he added.
Ang’s proposed spillway will have a diameter of 14 meters connected to a 50-foot-wide water tube that will suck floodwater from the lake to Manila Bay.
“The government knows about this long ago. That’s the most important flood-control project instead of just dredging,” he said.
The large spillway will also become a source of power, Ang added.
“Instead of the government’s paying the conglomerate for the construction cost, it will just ask for the sole rights to use the materials or the garbage that will come from the river, one of the dirtiest bodies of water in Metro Manila, but also a source of potable drinking water.
The trash that can be collected may also be fed to the waste-to-energy project that will be constructed along with the spillway.
The lake serves as a reservoir for floodwater to save Metro Manila from flooding. The Manggahan Floodway was constructed to divert floodwaters from Marikina River into the lake. The Napindan control station regulates the outflow of excess lake waters and minimizes the inflow of saline water and pollution from the Pasig River, the Laguna Lake Development Authority said.
Laguna de Bay is also used for power generation; three power plants are located in the region.