With Southeast Asia’s largest electricity bills rising even higher, Filipinos invest in rooftop panels.
Manila, Philippines – Keith Cantera and his family have been thinking about having their own solar power grid at home for years. But spending up to $5,000 for solar panels was nothing to scoff at, so they put the idea on the back burner.
It all changed this year when the United States-Israel war on Iran rattled global energy markets and sent electricity prices soaring. From paying a monthly bill of about $150 before the war began in late February, Cantera said his family went to forking out as much as $220.
Eight months later, they are having solar panels installed on their rooftop.
“The cost is about the same as paying our electric bills for three or four years based on the current rate,” Cantera said. “But in the fifth year, we’ll have recovered our investment, and electricity will essentially be free.”
Cantera is one of a growing number of Filipino homeowners turning to solar power in a country that had Southeast Asia’s highest electricity costs even before the war. They were comparable only to Singapore, where the average income is more than 10 times higher.
A report by the energy think tank Ember estimated that rooftop panels had nearly doubled in the Philippines since early 2025.
And in the first months of the war from March to May, the rush for solar power led to $407m in panel imports, according to government trade data from China, where most panels are manufactured. The Philippines became the biggest single overseas market for that period. Only the Netherlands bought more, but it redistributes them to the rest of Europe.
Lexus Grepo, CEO of the solar power supplier Solarmaxx, can attest to the boom.
“There is a 30-day wait because solar panel shipments can’t keep up,” Grepo said. “In March, we had 40 projects, which was almost triple our monthly clientele. Since then, we have been setting up 25 to 30 systems a month.”
Grepo does not expect demand to slow down even if tensions in the Middle East ease and shipping routes for energy supplies reopen.
“I think people now realise that the world is an unpredictable place, so they have to be ready for any eventuality. Filipinos now see that they don’t necessarily have to be at the mercy of the global energy market.”
The Philippines, one of the few countries in the region where electricity is not subsidised, relies on imported coal and gas for more than 70 percent of its power mix. The value of its currency, the peso, which has slid to a record low of more than 63 to the US dollar, is making these imports even costlier.
In late March, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr declared a national energy emergency in response to the war and what he described as the “imminent danger” posed to the national energy supply. Still, electricity rates have continued to increase.
The shift to solar is also partly driven by anger at electric companies that have come under scrutiny for charging customers for so-called system losses, which include illegal connections.
Cantera said learning about having to pay for someone else’s electricity consumption was the last straw.
“Who would agree to paying for something that you did not use? It’s not like the money we spend for electricity just fell from heaven,” he added.
But while the soaring demand is real, the upfront cost of a solar power system is still too high for most Filipinos. The government in March launched a new initiative offering loans for residential rooftop installations, but these are available only to public sector workers.
What officials hope can bring power rates down for the majority of people are the dozens of renewable energy projects in the pipeline, including a 3,500-hectare (8,650-acre) solar farm north of the capital, Manila, that is projected to be the largest in the world. When fully operational, the project is expected to generate 850 megawatts of electricity for 2.4 million households.
But some consumers said such projects could take years to complete, leaving them with ballooning electricity bills unless they take action themselves.
“It’s just so unpredictable nowadays. You have the impending El Nino weather pattern. There’s still war, the continuing fuel price hikes and so much more,” Cantera said. “So why not utilise a natural resource?”