The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) warned today that the Marcos Jr administration’s aggressive push for renewable energy and so-called “green investments” will trigger an unprecedented wave of land grabbing across the country, threatening farmers, indigenous peoples, and rural communities.

KMP said data from the Department of Energy (DOE) reveals the sheer scale of land requirements that the government is quietly approving. As of December 2024, combined awarded solar and wind projects need an estimated 3.113 million hectares of land—half of all agricultural land in the Philippines, and larger than the combined land area of Negros and Palawan.

Based on DOE’s own data and previously cited land-cost estimations, these renewable-energy awards, when implemented, will likely require millions of hectares of land, many of them formerly farmholdings, ancestral domains, coastal commons, forests, or fishing grounds. KMP said what DOE markets as “clean energy” threatens to become the largest wave of land dispossessions in decades.

“Marcos is allowing massive land-grab under guise of clean power. The government is auctioning off millions of hectares to foreign firms and local cronies while peasants face eviction, militarization, and loss of livelihood.”

The group cited that 963,185 hectares are needed for solar projects alone. More than 2 million hectares are required for wind projects, mostly in forestlands, ancestral domains, and coastal communities. The DOE is targetting 50 GW offshore wind target by 2050, even as the government has already awarded enough solar and wind projects to reach 158 GW, or eight times the Philippines’ 2024 peak demand. These will further expand with the latest round of Green Energy Auction Program (GEA-4).

In the GEA-4 concluded last month, the government awarded a total of 10,195.49 MW of renewable energy capacity to 123 bidders. The awarded projects span ground-mounted solar (4,179.09 MW), floating solar (2,284 MW), on-shore wind (2,518.29 MW), integrated renewable-plus-storage systems (1,189.29 MW), and rooftop solar (24.82 MW). SMC Global Light and Power Corp. garnered most of the awards. The awarded projects are scheduled for delivery between 2026 and 2029.

“How can a country with chronic rice and agriculture crisis afford to give away millions of hectares of productive land to corporations in the name of ‘clean energy’?” the group said. “Land-intensive solar farms, wind farms, floating PV systems, and proposed offshore wind and carbon-credit schemes threaten to concentrate control over land and resources, displace communities, and reinforce monopolies of energy generation and distribution.”

KMP warns that this “green energy boom” is precisely the kind of “false climate solution” that peasant and fisherfolk communities are warning about. “Behind every targeted megawatt and the green rhetoric lies a frantic scramble to convert vast tracts of land, coastal areas, forests, waterways, and agricultural lands into energy estates.”

In light of this alarming reality, KMP calls on Congress to immediately discuss HR 539 and HR 540 filed by Gabriela Women’s Party Rep Sarah Elago and Makabayan representatives. The resolutions seek a comprehensive congressional investigation in aid of legislation into large-scale RE projects that will foster massive landgrabbing and displacement of farmers. ###