PEMC to integrate Luzon, Visayas power spot marts

The Philippine Electricity Market Corp. (PEMC) plans to integrate the wholesale electricity spot market (WESM) in Luzon with its Visayas counterpart within the first half of 2007, PEMC president Lasse Holopainen said.

He said PEMC is currently seeking the approval of the Department of Energy (DOE) on the integration of the Visayas market. "We are targeting to have the Visayas WESM going by the second quarter of this year."

PEMC vice president for market operations Mario Pangilinan pointed out that they are merely waiting for the specific date to be set by the DOE on the WESM launching in the Visayas.

He said the PEMC staff, however, still need to focus on threshing out some technical issues. "Hopefully, we will resolve them by the second quarter of the year. Mostly, the concerns are on the physical challenges such metering, reliability of the energy management system data."

The integration of Visayas market, Holopainen said, may be able to help find a solution to an impending power supply problem in the region.

He said with the proposed Visayas market integration, more investors may come in, build new power plants, and add new capacity to the Visayas grid.