Latest news with #Francia
GMA Network
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- GMA Network
‘Sanggang Dikit FR' cast and crew to shoot scenes in Europe, UAE
'Sanggang Dikit FR' starring Jennylyn Mercado and Dennis Trillo is set to premiere soon and the exciting action-drama primetime series is one to watch for. At the upcoming series' media conference on Friday, it was revealed that the cast and crew will be shooting scenes in Milan in Italy, Zurich in Switzerland, and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. Aside from the shooting, the 'Sanggang Dikit FR' team was also invited to major Filipino community events abroad. They will have an exclusive meet and greet in Milan on June 22, the Philippine Festival 2025 in Zurich on June 28, and a meet and greet and the Global Filipino Career and Entrepreneurship Summit in Dubai on June 29. Vice President and Head of Operations of GMA International Joseph Francia said at the media con that the show and activities fall on the 20th anniversary of GMA International. 'As you know, mga kasama sa industry, we have many challenges. We need beautiful projects like ['Sanggang Dikit FR']—the storytelling, the visuals, beautiful cast, great acting—to continue to survive. Not to survive, but to thrive in this very challenging time in our industry," said Francia. Francia added that the public can look forward to the scenes to be filmed in the locations. 'And I'm sure, our viewers here and abroad are already excited for this new show.' In 'Sanggang Dikit FR,' Jennylyn stars as Roberta "Bobby" Enriquez, a bubbly yet highly competitive policewoman. Dennis plays Antonio "Tonyo" Guerrero, a skilled policeman who loves to improvise when solving crimes. Both burdened by personal losses, Bobby and Tonyo are brought together when a high-profile murder happens involving people who are very close to them. 'Sanggang Dikit FR' premieres on June 23 at 8:50 p.m. on GMA Prime. —CDC, GMA Integrated News
Daily Mail
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Elsa Pataky has fans doing a double take as she poses with her look-alike cousin in Paris: 'You look like identical twins'
Spanish actress Elsa Pataky had fans doing a double take on Sunday when she shared a picture of a look-alike family relative. The 48-year-old beauty, who is currently in France, posted a photo of herself posing with her cousin Mariana Montme. Elsa, who is married to Thor actor Chris Hemsworth, appears to have taken the selfie near the famed Alexandre III Bridge in Paris. Wearing her hair tied back, Elsa sported a brown jacket for her day out, while her cousin wore a white shirt and a checked jacket over a green T-shirt. Like Elsa, Mariana tied back her hair, which only emphasised the strong family likeness. From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the DailyMail's new showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop. The photo was among a gallery Elsa shared with followers to offer a glimpse of her trip to the City of Lights. Elsa's highlights included Dua Lipa in concert last week, as well as spending time with her pal, Australian singer-songwriter Kita Alexander. 'Fun girls night with Dua Lipa and Kit Alexander and so nice to walk around Paris with mi primi Mariana Montme,' Elsa wrote in the caption. Followers filled Elsa's comments about the likeness between the Fast and Furious actress and her cousin. 'How do they look alike!!' exclaimed one fan, while another agreed, writing: 'You look like identical twins.' 'Beautiful family blessings,' a third follower commented. Elsa is known to be very close to her cousin and the actress flew to London to attend Mariana's wedding in 2022. Elsewhere in Elsa's story, the actress and model posted a photo of herself posing backstage with Dua Lipa alongside Kitty Alexander and Kitty's four-year-old daughter Rumi. She also shared video of Dua's show last week at the La Défense Arena, in which Elsa can be seen rocking out with Kitty and her daughter. Fans recently went crazy over the ritzy Byron Bay pad Elsa shares with her husband Chris, 41, and their children—India Rose, 13, and twins Sasha and Tristan, 11. The couple, who purchased the 4.2 hectare estate back in 2014, have since built a state of the art mansion on the land worth $50 million that locals dub 'Fortress Hemsworth', according to The luxury home boasts stunning views of the Pacific Ocean, six sizeable bedrooms, indoor and outdoor gymnasiums, a media room, a spa and even has a bowling alley. But despite all of the property's lavish amenities, it's the Hemsworths' sprawling swimming pool that has everyone talking. At 50 metres long, the infinity pool is Olympic length and cost as much as $500,000. In March, Elsa revealed the decision to relocate to Australia with husband Chris was all about regaining perspective. Speaking to News Corp, Elsa said the couple found Los Angeles, where they were residing previously, too 'restricting'. 'When you're in Los Angeles, work suffocates you,' she said. She added Byron Bay was far removed from the constant industry chatter that plagues the City of Angels. 'There, all the conversations, even the billboards you see on the street, have to do with the world of cinema and its industry,' she said.
Telegraph
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Spanish PM doubles down on net zero after blackout
Spain's Socialist prime minister doubled down on a commitment to net zero over a week after an unprecedented blackout plunged the country into chaos. Pedro Sánchez said his government would not be changing course despite warnings from the national grid operator that increasing reliance on renewables risked system collapse. He also ruled out a rethink of its plan to scrap Spain's nuclear power stations. Mr Sánchez said the cause of the April 28 outage remained unknown, but that renewables were not to blame. 'There is not empirical evidence telling us that the incident was caused by an excess of renewable energy sources or from a lack of nuclear power,' he said to parliament on Wednesday. Hitting back at calls for the government to about-turn on scrapping the nuclear stations, he said nuclear power advocates were using the blackout as an excuse for a 'gigantic manipulation exercise'. 'Not a single serious study says nuclear power is essential for Spain,' he said. 'In Spain, the future of energy lies in other sources such as hydroelectric, solar, wind and green hydrogen. Renewables are not only the future; they are our only choice.' Before the blackout hit, renewables were generating 71 per cent of the grid's electricity. Solar power accounted for more than half of the input into the system. The collapse on April 28, which also knocked out power across Portugal and parts of southern France, lasted throughout the afternoon and into the evening in many places, with the grid recovering full power by 6am the next day. Mr Sánchez said that in the moments before the lights went out, three incidents were registered in the system: one in the south of the country and two in the south-west. All were in areas that generate large amounts of solar power. The prime minister said he understood that people were impatient to know the reason for the blackout, but warned it would take time to reconstruct the sequence of events. The ministries leading the investigation had gathered 756 million data points from the electricity system, Mr Sánchez noted, insisting that Spain's grid 'is among the safest in the world'. Spain's government has not ruled out the possibility that a cyberattack caused the blackout. The Red Eléctrica grid operator said it was not the victim of an attack on April 28, but that the causes of the incidents that took place in regional sub-grids have yet to be clarified. Mr Sánchez said Spain's critical infrastructure received a thousand cyberattacks last year and pledged to improve the security of telecommunications, airports and the electricity grid. About 31 per cent of a £9 billion defence plan announced last month would be allocated towards upgrading telecommunications and cybersecurity capabilities, he said. Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the opposition People's Party leader, said Mr Sánchez was 'taking Spaniards for fools' with Wednesday's speech to parliament. 'In an hour and a half he did not explain why the lights went out or how we are going to pay for the €10.5 billion in military spending.' Mr Sánchez's coalition government is divided on the need to boost defence spending, and has not been able to pass a state budget since before the last general election in 2023.
Straits Times
07-05-2025
- Business
- Straits Times
Mitsubishi joins Singapore firms in climate plan to close Philippine coal plant early
The aim is to retire a 246 MW coal plant in Batangas province by 2030 and replace it with renewable energy and battery storage. PHOTO: ACEN SINGAPORE - Japanese conglomerate Mitsubishi Corporation on May 7 joined Singapore's Keppel and investment platform GenZero in a climate initiative that aims to retire a Philippine coal plant early using funds from a new type of carbon credit backed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). The initiative, if successful, could be a model used to shut down dozens of other coal plants early around the globe, especially in Asia which is heavily reliant on the polluting fuel. The aim is to retire a 246 megawatt (MW) coal plant in Batangas province, South Luzon, by 2030 – ahead of its scheduled closure in 2040 – and replace it with renewable energy and battery storage. Shutting it down a decade early could save 19 million tonnes of planet-warming carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions – and cut local air pollution. The catch is that closing the plant early is costly. Replacing it with green power generation and new power lines, as well as compensation for the lost 10 years of electricity income, would cost over US$1 billion (S$1.29 billion), said Mr Eric Francia, president and chief executive of the plant's owner Acen , which is the listed energy platform of the Ayala Group. 'We're still finalising the numbers, we're talking about US$1.5 billion-plus overall cost,' he told The Straits Times at the May 5 to 8 GenZero Climate Summit 2025 at the Sands Expo and Convention Centre. Fully replacing the coal plant with the same level of on-demand power would require 1,000MW of solar, 250MW of wind and 1,000MW of battery energy storage, according to The Rockefeller Foundation, which is also involved in the project. To help share the cost, Acen in 2024 teamed up with the Temasek-owned GenZero and Keppel as equity partners. On May 7, Mitsubishi and its power generation subsidiary Diamond Generating Asia joined as the new collaborators – the hope is that with Mitsubishi joining, the credits might eventually be able to be used in Japan's emissions trading scheme. The partners want to pioneer the use of transition credits to help fund the shutdown of the Acen plant. Transition credits aim to monetise the emissions savings from the early closure of coal plants. Revenue would come from the sale of high-integrity carbon credits to companies or governments, with each credit representing a tonne of emissions avoided by shutting a power plant early. The credits act as a de-risking tool for green financing. Without the credit revenues, the economics for the early closure of the plant would be hard to justify, Mr Francia said. Coal plants have a lifespan of 40 to 50 years, and investors recoup their money via long-term power-purchase contracts with utilities. Carbon finance can help bridge the gap in revenue caused by a plant's early retirement by funding the revenue loss and the costs of swopping coal power for renewable energy. In South-east Asia, coal power plants are the main source of electricity and a major source of air pollution and carbon emissions driving climate change. Many of the plants are young, with an average age of 15 years, meaning keeping them running to the end of their useful life would be highly polluting. The Singapore government regards transition credits as a key way to help accelerate the green transition in the region. The credits are nascent but have strong support from MAS, other financial institutions and large corporates. In December 2023, MAS launched the Transition Credits Coalition (Traction), which is backed by nearly 30 members. The coalition is studying ways to use and scale up deployment of the credits. And since 2023, MAS, Acen and The Rockefeller Foundation have been developing a methodology for coal transition carbon credits under the foundation's Coal to Clean Credit Initiative (CCCI), which aims to shut down dozens of coal plants early across the globe. On May 6, Verra, a non-profit certification body that issues v erified c arbon u nits for carbon reduction projects, officially approved the CCCI's methodology, the first of its kind. Mr Francia said it was likely the Acen project will use the CCCI transition credits methodology but that final approval was still needed among all the partners. He said he hoped the Singapore government might be among the buyers of the credits and linked the future price of the credits to the Republic's estimated carbon tax price of $50 to $80 per tonne of emissions in the coming years. 'We're anchoring this to the Singapore carbon tax, hopefully we would be closer to the lower end of the $50 to $80 range,' he said. The Rockefeller Foundation says the goal of the CCCI and its newly approved methodology is to retire 60 coal plants globally, many of them in Asia, by 2030. Newly released figures from the foundation shows that shutting down that many could unlock US$110 billion in public and private investment in green energy, while preventing 9,900 early deaths and generating 29,000 new jobs. The Powering Past Coal Alliance, which works to hasten the transition to clean energy, said it welcomed the Philippines coal plant initiative. The alliance is a coalition of over 180 governments, businesses and organisations, including Singapore . 'This project showcases the potential of carbon credits to fund early plant closures and help achieve a timely, secure and just transition out of coal,' said Dr Julia Skorupska, head of the alliance's secretariat. 'Accelerating the transition from coal to clean is one of the most important steps we can take to address climate risks and secure the long-term prosperity in South-east Asia,' she told ST. Large US corporations are also showing keen interest in transition credits, said Dr Nat Keohane, president of Washington-based think-tank the Centre for Climate and Energy Solutions (C2ES). He announced the launch of the Kinetic Coalition at the summit on May 6. He told ST that the coalition, which is hosted by C2ES acting as its secretariat, included 20 large potential buyers of the credits including PepsiCo, Amazon, Mastercard and McDonald's. The coalition aims to accelerate corporate investment in clean energy in emerging economies. 'Those 20 buyers are all saying, ' We want to be part of this journey.' The driver for them is always, how do we get clean energy and clean energy systems in our value chains,' he said. David Fogarty is deputy foreign editor at The Straits Times and senior climate writer. He also covers the environment, in areas ranging from biodiversity to plastic pollution. Find out more about climate change and how it could affect you on the ST microsite here.
Bloomberg
06-05-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Spain Working With France, Portugal to Make Grid More Robust
Spain is working with France and Portugal to strengthen its power grid and has made interconnections a high priority, the country's top energy official told senators a week after a nationwide blackout. 'We've been working with France, Portugal and the European Commission so that these interconnections arrive as soon as possible,' Sara Aagesen, minister for the environmental transition, said at the Senate in Madrid. 'The more interconnections, the more robust' the network will be, she said.
