Bantayan Island fully energized by 2022 – Banelco

MANILA, Philippines — Bantayan Island Electric Cooperative Inc. (Banelco) has committed to energize its entire franchise area by 2022, in support of the government’s electrification agenda.

“While Bantayan Island was dubbed as the next major tourist destination in the country, our main objective is total electrification of every households in our franchise area by the year 2022 consistent with the national government’s strategy,” Banelco general manager Lee Rivera said.

“As a tourist destination, reliable power supply is a vital factor to address the consequent growth in power demand and to sustain the economic development of Bantayan Island,” he said.

“Banelco has upgraded its distribution system,  especially the backbone lines, in anticipation of the increase in load demand based on our ERC-approved capex plan to avoid power outages due to overloaded conductors and minimize line faults,” Rivera said.

Banelco has engaged another power supplier, Isla Norte Energy Corp. (INEC), the joint venture of Vivant Energy Corp. and Gigawatt Power Inc., to  provide additional power source amid the power supply shortages experienced in the past months which resulted in rotational brownouts.

INEC has installed an additional three-megawatt generator sets since Aug.  11, 2020.

“The additional three-MW gensets stabilized the power supply situation in the island and significantly improved the power supply reliability which will benefit over 33,000 connected consumers,” Rivera said.

He said Banelco experienced uncharacteristic growth in demand every year over the past six years, consistently surpassing  forecasts.

“This is primarily due to the positive tourism activity in the island that is increasing every year before the pandemic. Our long term plan with regards to power supply was to have a stable and reliable power,” he said.