A lawmaker on Monday is seeking an investigation into the country’s series of power interruptions and electrical disturbances for the past weeks, insisting that the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines should be held liable.
Senator Sherwin Gatchalian — who is also the vice-chairperson of the committee on Energy — filed Resolution 607 calling for a Senate inquiry into the series of disturbances in the country’s power transmission system “in the hope of ensuring a reliable and continuous electricity supply.”
“These successive transmission system disturbances caused inconvenience to communities and losses to businesses,” said Gatchalian. “The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines as the operator of the transmission system in the country should be held to account for the root cause of these disturbances.”
The senator made the call after the NGCP placed the Luzon grid under red and yellow alerts after reporting the power plant outages due to the tripping of the Bolo-Masinloc 230kV Line 2 on 8 May.
He also cited that it led to the tripping of 2 units of the Masinloc Coal Power Plant which, in turn, caused a power loss of 659 megawatts in the Luzon grid.
“Such disturbances brought power interruptions in the franchise areas of various distribution facilities across Luzon island,” said the senator, adding that in the Meralco franchise, in particular, more than 300,000 customers in Paco and Sta. Mesa in Manila, Caloocan, Malabon, Batangas, Antipolo in Rizal, San Pedro and Biñan in Laguna, and San Rafael and Pulilan in Bulacan were affected by the tripping activity.
To recall, Meralco on 9 May reported power supply cuts due to a temporary system imbalance caused by a sudden plant outage, saying that the power supply disruption was caused by an automatic load dropping of approximately 290 MW as a result of the tripping of the Duhat-Hermosa 290kV line.
On 27 April, the NGCP reported a system disturbance in the Visayas, causing a loss of 322.3 MW and power interruptions that persisted until 30 April.
More than 1.5 million households were affected by the power interruptions in the islands of Panay, Guimaras and Negros. The power outages last up to 12 hours.
Meanwhile, Senator JV Ejercito is seeking to review the NGCP’s franchise and assessment of its performance after receiving reports that foreign shareholders have more control of the company.
“Utilities that are concerned with national security should remain with the national government, controlled by the Philippines,” Ejercito said.
As this developed, more senators on Monday expressed their openness to the call to review the Congressional franchise given to the NGCP due to the recent power outages in several parts of the country.
Senator Grace Poe, chair of the Senate Committee on Public Services, said that her panel is open to the review of the congressional franchise of the NGCP “as it concerns a critical need of Filipinos.”
“The recurring power outages being experienced by millions of households amid the scorching months should not be the norm,” Poe said. “We must also exercise vigilance when it comes to our power lines, to ensure that electricity running from Luzon to Mindanao remains under the control of Filipinos amid security concerns raised by senators.”
Senator Risa Hontiveros echoed the same sentiment, saying there is nothing wrong with the Upper Chamber if it would review the franchise of the privately-owned corporation.
“Even during the previous Congress, we have started, in a way, the review of at least some provisions in the franchise because the government is not only one that has an obligation in this contract but the corporation itself,” Hontiveros said.
In other developments, the Energy Regulatory Commission is already doing its part by auditing the NGCP on the completion of the transmission projects as part of the ongoing rate reset process of the grid operator, ERC chairperson Monalisa Dimalanta told Daily Tribune.
Dimalanta’s remark came in response to Albay Rep. Joey Salceda’s call to ERC to use its powers under Republic Act 9511 or the NGCP franchise to mandate performance improvements in the transmission company following blackouts caused by delays and damage to the company’s transmission lines.
“If you recall, NGCP’s allowable revenues are set on a 5-year cycle supposedly, but the last one happened back in 2010, which set NGCP’s allowed revenues and corresponding rates for 2011-2015,” Dimalanta said.
She added that the power regulator is already “conducting the review and reset now for the past years (2016-2022) and in parallel the process to set their revenues based on forecasted expenses for 2023-2027.”
Salceda tapped the ERC to conduct a performance audit on the NGCP after its supposed deadline for its major three major projects — the Cebu-Negros-Panay connection and the Mindanao-Visayas interconnection — that was due by August this year.
With Edjen Oliquino