Can you talk about you or your company’s efforts relating to renewability, sustainability or other environmentally-friendly activities?

ACEN aspires to be a renewables and sustainability leader not just in the Philippines but in the Asia Pacific region. To this end, ACEN has announced the following near-term, medium-term, and long-term goals and targets: achieve 5 GW of attributable renewable energy (“RE”) capacity by 2025, transition to 100% RE generation capacity by 2025, achieve 20 GW of attributable RE capacity by 2030, become the largest listed renewables platform in Southeast Asia, and achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

To fund its numerous projects and M&As, the ACEN group has turned to green and sustainability-linked financing to raise capital and deploy funds to support its RE initiatives and growth targets. These financing efforts are tied to specific green- and sustainability-linked covenants which attracted investments particularly from sustainability-sensitive investors.

Why are in-house lawyers well-placed to drive change in their organisations?

In-house counsels are now very much immersed in the business and finance of their organisations. This is true for ACEN as its in-house counsels are part of the senior leadership team and critical members of the strategic thinking process. We are well placed to drive change because our training and expertise have allowed us to become trusted members of the organisation and we have a deep understanding of the company’s business and the legal and regulatory regime that we operate in. When we bring our expertise and critical thinking to the table, we are able to offer a more holistic view across the issues, plans, and strategies of the company. We also have a wide legal network (of fellow in-house counsels and external counsels) which we leverage to share and recommend substantive, real-time changes. Devising solutions based on the experiences of others and on global trends helps ACEN adapt and continue to be relevant.