Transco notes rise in power consumption of the Vis-Min area

Power transmitted to the Visayas and Mindanao grids increased by 0.5 percent and 2.7 percent, respectively, this year compared to the same period last year, with the Visayas accounting for 10,417.1 MW-month and Mindanao, 14,637.2 MW-month, the National Transmission Corporation reported recently.

But nationally, total power delivery in 2005 decreased by less than one percent with total delivery of 101,675 megawatt per month of power to the country's major electricity grids.

The power delivery hike in the Visayas was attributed to the higher power demands recorded for Central Negros Electric Coop, Negros Oriental II Electric Coop, Aklan Electric Coop, Cebu Electric Coop I & II and Mactan Electric Company

It was in the Luzon grid that power delivery dipped by 1.7 percent owing to the 2.5 percent decrease in power wheeling to Manila Electric Company, the biggest utility customer in the country.

Power delivery measured in megawatt-months refers to the sum of TransCo's monthly billing demand in megawatts.

TransCo president and chief executive officer Alan Ortiz said the state utility firm has been expediting the completion and implementation of several interconnection and uprating projects to respond to the steadily increasing power demands in the Visayas and Mindanao. These include the Wright-Calbayog, Abaga-Kirahon and the Kirahon-Maramag-Bunawan transmission line projects, among others. In the Visayas, aside from increase in demands of several distribution utilities, industrial customers such as

Alturas Group of Companies and Marcela Industrial Plant also posted an increase of about 28 percent in their power requirements. This is in addition to the load from newly connected Visayas grid customer Dynasty Management & Development Corp. - Wenna A. Berondo