As countries in Southeast Asia race to meet their clean power targets by the end of this decade, some governments have introduced fast-tracked permitting processes for renewable energy projects.
The Philippines has been a regional frontrunner in implementing policies to expedite the permitting of renewable projects. In 2023, the government issued an executive order to allow projects deemed “strategic” investments to secure faster approvals through so-called “green lane certificates of endorsement”.
As of June, 176 renewable energy projects in line with the country’s goal of hitting 35 per cent renewable energy in its energy mix by 2030 – primarily large-scale wind and solar – amounting to P5.3 trillion (US$93 billion) have been awarded a green lane status.
Over the past few years, Vietnam and Thailand have also streamlined the processes for project auctions and securing land-use and environmental approvals to boost their renewable energy share by 2030.
However, within the region and beyond, projects have run into opposition from conservationists and local communities due to competing demands for land.
In 2024, conservationists were concerned to find drilling operations for the development of a proposed wind farm in a sensitive karst ecosystem in the Philippines, though the project had secured all the necessary permits, according to its developer.
Earlier this year, Indian conglomerate Adani pulled out of a wind project which has been strongly opposed by environmentalists due to the potential ecological damage to the Sri Lankan district of Mannar – a critical node in one of the most important bird migration corridors globally.
“Asia is a very concerning area because of the pace and the size of some developments,” said Tris Allinson, a senior conservation scientist at BirdLife International, a wildlife conservation group.
In India, Adani started its construction of what is slated to be the world’s largest renewable energy park this year. The 30 gigawatt (GW) solar-wind hybrid Khavda project, expected to be fully operational by 2028, will span 538 square kilometres – almost three-quarters the size of the island-state of Singapore.
“This is industrial development on a massive scale,” Allinson told Eco-Business. “So the speed and scale of renewables development in countries that don’t necessarily have a history of high environmental standards is challenging.”
“Compared to traditional forms of energy generation, wind and solar facilities are quite space-intensive,” said Allinson. He added that new transmission infrastructure will also need to be built to distribute renewable energy from where it is generated to where it is needed, which could have even more of an impact on birds than the wind and solar facilities themselves.
Indian conglomerate Adani Group is building the world’s largest renewable energy park to date in the state of Gujarat. When completed in 2027, it will be visible from space. Image: Adani Green Energy
For countries to achieve all their climate targets, the International Energy Authority estimates that the world needs to add or replace 80 million kilometres of grids – effectively doubling the existing amount of power lines – by 2040.
“At the end of the day, utility-scale renewables are large infrastructure. It’s not an automatic given that it will be harmless and good,” cautioned Cynthia Morel, principal strategist at non-profit Forum for the Future.
“Many people are for renewable energy and biodiversity – both of those causes are very noble. But what’s happening is we’re seeing intensified competition for limited resources, be they land or marine space,” said Morel, who is also the programme lead for the Responsible Energy Initiative (REI) Philippines, which was launched by a consortium of six think tanks and civil society organisations, including Forum for the Future, last year.
“If we don’t find new models to shift from the mindset of single land use to accommodating multiple land uses, we’re going to see an increasing number of conflicts that we’ve seen emerge in the Philippines and other contexts.”
Applying the mitigation hierarchy to renewables
“The way to develop anything sustainably is the adoption of a mitigation hierarchy,” said Allinson. “This means that first you try to avoid the impact. That’s particularly possible with wind and solar because we have a lot of options that are technically feasible with minimal impact from a biodiversity point of view.”
Only in cases where impact is not entirely avoidable, should developers consider moving on to the next step in the mitigation hierarchy to minimise impact, he said. For wind projects, this includes shutting down turbines on demand when birds are spotted, which is practiced in the Red Sea Flyway during the migratory season. The last stage would be offsetting any residual impacts.
“If you say, it’s unavoidable that we will still kill 10 golden eagles, you can do some kind of supplementary conservation action which supports the conservation of 10 golden eagles,” said Allinson.
Open-source spatial mapping tools, such as BirdLife’s AviStep – which maps out the risk that different types of renewable energy infrastructure pose to bird populations – can be utilised by governments and companies to choose locations based not just on what is commercially or technically most viable, said Allinson.
“We do end up seeing quite a lot of poor site selections. That’s why we get involved in lobbying against them,” said Allinson. “This creates the idea that environmental organisations are against renewable energy when in reality, we’re against poorly chosen sites where nobody’s bothered to think about the biodiversity implications, particularly given that there are a lot more suitable locations available.”
BirdLife has already developed maps depicting the sensitivity of birds to onshore and offshore wind, solar and power lines for India, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam and Central Asia. Eco-Business understands that it is in the midst of discussions to expand its work in the region to the Philippines, Indonesia, Cambodia and Bangladesh.
Much of the Mekong Delta where Vietnam is building onshore wind projects, such as Ben Tre and Bac Lieu, have high avian sensitivity. Source: AviStep
The organisation has also been working directly with regional governments, such as Vietnam, and development banks like Asian Development Bank (ADB) to improve renewables planning, shared Allinson.
REI Philippines is also bringing together developers, civil society groups and financiers looking at various ways to enable an ecologically safe and socially just energy system, including more farmer-centric spatial planning.
For instance, REI Philippines is looking at how farmers and fisherfolk in vulnerable communities can be equipped with templates and paralegal support to explore mutually beneficial lend-lease agreements when approached by developers with offers to buy out their land for renewable projects.
“The farmers are not necessarily knowledgeable of any other options… But if we bring in paralegal support, other players like civil society organisations and finance into the picture, we can potentially create new structures that drive agrivoltaics – that is, renewables and agriculture combined,” said Morel.
But Kitty Bu, vice president, Southeast Asia at Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP), flagged that ensuring environmental and social harms are avoided becomes “significantly more complex and costly” for smaller projects dealing with last mile communities in Southeast Asia, compared to more well-established markets with better access to financing.
GEAPP, a global climate initiative backed by the Bezos Earth Fund, Rockefeller Foundation and IKEA Foundation, has been working with Indonesian state utility PLN to help residents on remote islands transition from diesel to renewable generation with battery storage, while accounting for livelihoods dependent on the diesel value chain.
“You’re looking at possibly screening 100 different islands. It is one thing to invest in one huge infrastructure project in one location with one set of stringent standards to be met. That’s very different from the programme that we’re doing,” said Bu. “Every site requires evaluation.”
Bridging the gap with international standards
Alan Yau, chief executive of Southeast Asia-focused renewables developer Verdant Energy, noted that “nearly all, if not most of the projects that we encounter, will have some sort of issue.”
The Singapore-based Verdant Energy is backed by Danish fund manager AP Moller Capital and development finance institutions like the World Bank’s private finance arm International Finance Corporation (IFC), Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, German Investment Corporation and the United States’ Development Finance Institution. The company, which also counts Singapore state investor Temasek and numerous pension funds in Denmark among its shareholders, is looking to build a US$2 billion portfolio of solar, wind and battery storage projects across the region by 2029.
Yau said that since the firm’s establishment last year, it has inherited 15 corporate policies from AP Moller Capital, including environmental, social and governance (ESG), anti-bribery and anti-corruption considerations.
All investment decisions will also have to pass the scrutiny of a board-level ESG committee, to assess whether they are aligned with all the investors’ environmental and social safeguards including the IFC’s performance standards, which Yau told Eco-Business is its “first line of defense”.
“The first hurdle for us is always the IFC’s exclusion list. If a potential project is on the exclusion list, then regardless of how attractive it is, we are not going to touch it,” said Yau.
Next, the company will perform a background check on all proponents of the project, to ensure it is not dealing with a “politically exposed person” susceptible to bribery or corruption, before categorising the projects based on their potential environmental and social risks, he added.
Depending on the categorisation of projects, different levels of due diligence will be carried out by accredited third-party consultants, such as ERM, DNV GL and Black & Veatch, shared Yau.
“Unlike in a developed economic environment, where the moment we identify an issue from the environmental and social impact assessment (ESIA) we will immediately kill the project because everything is very well-defined, in this part of the world… unless it’s a dealbreaker as it is on the exclusion list or does not comply with local regulations, we will take a more pragmatic approach before coming to a final conclusion.”
“I’m not saying we are going to move the goal post… We are sticking firmly to our principles on ESIA and ESG issues,” said Yau. “I’m just saying that we have to dribble a bit more before we come to the goal post and decide whether we’re going to shoot or not.”
“Fundamentally, sitting on a high pedestal and saying that every project has to meet IFC performance standards is also not right,” said Verdant Energy’s chief investment officer Sivaramakrishnan Sreedharan. “Are we complying with the right standard which is applicable to that jurisdiction, plus bridging that gap to make it world class with reference to those standards? That’s what we are looking to do.”
In response to Eco-Business’ queries on how IFC is taking into account the local or regional contexts when applying its performance standards, a spokesperson said that “compliance with environmental and social statutory requirements in the project’s host country serves as the foundation for applying these standards.”
The spokesperson added that institution’s “extensive experience in emerging markets around the world shows that applying safeguard standards also helps reduce financial and commercial risks in projects.”
“In fact, application of IFC’s environmental and social requirements frequently facilitates mobilisation of additional capital for renewable energy projects from third-party investors, including from around 150 leading emerging market banks and other financial institutions that voluntarily apply these requirements.”
Sreedharan said that multilateral development banks, like ADB, are key to “[playing] a balancing act between ESG and development.”
For instance, the ADB’s 600-MW Monsoon wind farm in Laos, which recently completed construction, was classified as category A – which represents the highest potential for significant adverse impacts – under policies related to the environment, involuntary resettlement and Indigenous peoples.
These ESG-related issues led at least three banks to pull out of the project, Sreedharan understands. But as the lead arranger of the US$692.55 million financing agreement for the project, ADB “took some calculated ESG risks” in order to meet the region’s clean energy development needs.
After over a decade of negotiations, Southeast Asia’s first cross-border wind project in Laos officially started supplying power to Vietnam in July. Image: ADB
While ADB did not confirm the number of banks that dropped out of financing the project due to ESG concerns, its regional director for Southeast Asia Jackie Surtani told Eco-Business that projects like the Monsoon wind farm “exemplify the highest ESG standards while delivering significant clean energy benefits.”
“ADB’s rigorous safeguards framework and environmental and social standards ensure that all projects undergo comprehensive due diligence,” said Surtani. “These safeguards do not compromise commercial viability – in fact, the Monsoon project not only achieved its financing target but also represents one of ADB’s largest co-financing mobilisations to date.”
“At the end of the day, a lot of the traditional banks have to come down to that approach: am I making a positive impact with as minimum ESG impact as possible? Obviously you can’t have huge red flags – you can’t build it in a protected reserve… But you’ll have to make that trade-off,” said Sreedharan.
‘Move at the speed of trust’
While acknowledging the urgency to transition to renewables, Morel noted that it could be costly to developers who lack the social license to operate, as they would not be able to press ahead with projects they have invested huge amounts of initial capital into.
“Unless we move at the speed of trust, we risk slowing down the transition,” warned Morel. “If we don’t have all the relevant stakeholders agreeing on how to move forward and being enfranchised by the process, rather than marginalised by it, the risk of mounting community opposition is very real.”
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Unless we move at the speed of trust, we risk slowing down the transition.
Cynthia Morel, principal strategist, Forum for the Future
In June, the ADB was forced to cancel a proposed loan for a 1 GW solar park in Assam, a state in northeastern India, following protests from local communities from 24 villages facing displacement due to the project.
While ADB did not respond to queries on how the high-risk project had initially been approved under its safeguard policies, a spokesperson told Eco-Business that “the loan and technical assistance were cancelled by ADB pursuant to the Indian Ministry of Finance’s request dated 23 May 2025.”
“Banks have long claimed that this trade-off between development objectives and community rights is inevitable,” said Radhika Goyal, a policy associate from US-based legal non-profit Accountability Counsel. “In fact, when environmental and social standards are respected… local communities are more likely to have access to clean energy.”
“IFC and ADB’s commitment to environmental and social safeguards is the fundamental thing distinguishing them as development banks, not commercial lenders,” said Goyal. “Often, their investments derisk projects for other investors with lower standards, and if they aren’t properly selecting and managing projects to protect people and the planet, then they have abandoned their mission and are paving the way for harm.”
“The question we should be asking is how can ADB and IFC ensure that renewable energy production does not follow the same extractivist patterns of fossil fuel energy that leads to widespread impoverishment and energy injustice. Because why else do they exist?”
In his over a decade of experience working in energy infrastructure development across the region, Verdant Energy’s Yau said that the integrity of projects “all boils down to who you’re working with.”
“We would only be comfortable working with people who share the same mindset, integrity and respect for ESG issues. Otherwise we would walk away from deals.”
Yau shared that the company was approached by a renowned project developer in the Philippines earlier this year about a utility-scale project. While assessing the breakdown of services this prospective local partner would be providing to earn its “development fee” per industry practice, his team noticed a line item called “relationship management fee”.
That was when Yau’s team decided they would not be proceeding with the deal, though the project appeared attractive in terms of returns.
“Over the years, we have seen so many of these people… If they try to cut corners and do funny things, the issues will inevitably come back and bite them,” said Yau.
Lingering challenges
Conservationists are especially concerned about the large-scale renewable projects being built in the region’s developing nations, like Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, where environmental governance is weak.
Vietnam, in particular, has seen the fastest-growing wind farm development across the region.
Its installed wind power capacity has grown over hundredfold over the last decade, from 53 megawatts (MW) in 2013 to approximately 5,888 MW in 2023. According to the country’s latest power development plan, it is looking to scale its wind capacity to 27,990 MW by 2030.
But many of these wind farms have been constructed “without much thinking,” said Yong Ding Li, BirdLife International’s head of species conservation and flyways in Asia.
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East Asian countries are not catching up fast enough on the potential biodiversity impact of renewable energy… People who are investing in wind, solar and dams are moving much faster than the policymakers.
Yong Ding Li, head of species conservation and flyways, Asia, BirdLife International
In the Mekong Delta, one of Southeast Asia’s key coastal landscapes for migratory waterbirds, BirdLife has become aware of wind farms being built along the coastline of Dong Thap (formerly Tien Giang) and Vinh Long (formerly Ben Tre) provinces, said Yong.
The environmental group is working closely with the Vietnam government on migratory species conservation to ensure that key areas of mudflats in the Mekong Delta are considered for long-term conservation plans, he shared.
While Yong acknowledged that the government has taken a stronger stance on the protection of wetlands and migratory species in recent years, it feels “too little too late for the Mekong Delta.”
Compared to North Asia, research is also lacking in Southeast Asia regarding the impact of infrastructural development on birds and on migratory species, noted Yong.
“The focus for the longest time has always been on deforestation and forest fragmentation, and to some extent hydropower,” he said. “So that mismatch of knowledge and interest in different conservation issues is also a challenge.”
“East Asian countries are not catching up fast enough on the potential biodiversity impact of renewable energy… Legislation is just not going fast enough, so people who are investing in wind, solar and dams are moving much faster than the policymakers. That is something that worries me as someone who lives here.”
