Power plants can resume maintenance shutdowns

MANILA, Philippines - Power plants have been cleared to conduct maintenance shutdowns.

“If you recall, we asked power plants not to conduct repairs or maintenance schedules during election day plus, minus one week. Those who have not yet implemented maintenance outage, they can start this week,” Energy Secretary Zenaida Monsada told a press briefing yesterday.

Monsada said these maintenance shutdowns would not be held simultaneously to ensure sufficient power supply in the grid.

She said one of the plants that would undergo maintenance shutdown is the 382-megawatt (MW) Pagbilao Unit 1. The plant will be offline for 73 days starting today.

While power plants can resume maintenance shutdowns, Monsada allayed fears of inadequate power supply, saying demand is seen to decline as the rainy season approaches.

She said peak demand could go down to pre-El Niño levels of 8,800-MW compared to the 9,726-MW peak demand on May 3.

There are enough power reserves in case of forced outages, she added.