NEA fasttracking rural electrification

MANILA, Philippines - The National Electrification Administration (NEA) is targeting to complete the Sitio Electrification Program (SEP) six-months ahead of schedule to avoid coinciding with the national elections in May 2016.

NEA, a government owned-and-controlled corporation, is tasked to carry out electrification on an area coverage basis, through the electric cooperatives.

The state-owned agency committed to electrify 32,441 sitios until the end of President Aquino’s term in June 2016.

However, NEA administrator Edita Bueno said the agency will work to finish the electrification program this year.

“We are targeting to do this by the end of the year, though we said before that these will all be energized until the President’s term is done,” she said.

“We want to do it much earlier considering the elections on the first part of next year, so we don’t want to be distracted,” she added.

As of end-July, NEA has achieved 79 percent of the target under the SEP, equivalent to 25,257 sitios.

There are still 6,884 sitios to be energized, where 2,301 are scheduled to be energized in the third quarter and 4,583 in the fourth quarter.

“But we hope that we can advance some to the third quarter. We have  several strategies to be able to do that,” Bueno said.

Among the measures NEA has put in place included housewiring and installation cost; accredited regional technical evaluators; created Sitio Implementation Unit in the electric cooperatives; encouraged participation of civil society organizations; issued unbundled price index of 5 MVA and 10 MVA substations; and seriously complied with Commission on Audit rules and regulations.