By Alena Mae S. Flores

The Philippine unit of Royal Philips Electronics of the Netherlands has offered to supply an initial five million compact fluorescent lamps to the government for its energy efficiency program.

Gerard Kleisterlee, Royal Philips chief executive, told reporters that the global consumer electronics company forwarded its bid to the Energy Department and was awaiting the results.

Philips Philippines is among the seven companies that submitted bids to the department. The five million lamps, or CFL, comprise the first batch of the 13 million CFLs that will replace incandescent bulbs in the Philippines.

The first batch of five million CFLs will be distributed by July to residential customers in Metro Manila and the cities of Cebu, Cagayan de Oro and Davao.

“We put in a good bid,” Kleisterlee said, adding that his company would take care of disposing lighting bulbs with mercury content.

“We need to have an efficient collection system and Philips takes that responsibility,” he said.

Royal Philips is a world leader in health care, lifestyle and lighting. Philips employs approximately 121,000 employees in more than 60 countries worldwide. The group reported sales of 26 billion euro in 2008.

“There is a big opportunity to conserve. We conduct audits of buildings on how they can be more energy efficient. We made a new lighting plan for them. The audit leads to insight [for companies to be more energy efficient],” Kleisterlee said.

The replacement of incandescent bulbs is part of the government’s Philippine Energy Efficiency Project that aims to provide direct economic benefits to the country by reducing energy demand and displacing imported fuel.

“Lighting accounts for more than 50 percent of the evening peak load in the rural Philippines... The use of proven technology in efficient lighting can reduce this demand by 40 to 80 percent,” Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes said.

The replacement of incandescent bulbs is expected to reduce peak demand by 450 megawatts, lower oil imports by $120 million each year, generate clean development mechanism revenues of about $10 million for 2010-2012 and create an energy- efficient market.

The Asian Development Bank is backing the energy project with a $31.1-million loan.