Mindanao power supply continues to dip

DAVAO CITY, Philippines  – The power supply in the south continues to plunge as power outages in a large part of the island last from eight to 12 hours.

The National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) yesterday placed the deficit for Mindanao at 277 megawatts (MW), as system capacity was only 986MW while demand peaked at 1263MW.

A load curtailment of about 350MW is now being implemented in Mindanao due to the acute shortage in power.

The Agus-Pulangi power plant is also undergoing a month-long rehabilitation, which contributes to the further decrease in the power supply in Mindanao.

Officials are fast-tracking the creation of the Mindanao Power Monitoring Committee (MPMC) and the One-Stop Shop Processing Center (OSSPC) in an effort to solve the prevailing power crisis in Mindanao.

The creation of the MPMC and the OSSPC was upon instruction of President Aquino to address the power situation in the south.

Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA) chair Lualhati Antonino said the President also pushed for the immediate drafting of the executive order that would support the creation of both the MPMC and the OSSPC.

Antonino said the MinDA Board of Directors held a special meeting to tackle the creation of the two action points, which would be responsible for providing outright information regarding the energy and power situation including, but not limited to, supply and price levels.

“We are grateful to the President for the time and effort he exerted to reach out to the people of Mindanao and for providing an opportunity for various sectors to be heard on the urgent issue of power,” Antonino said.

MPMC will be chaired by MinDA and composed of representatives from Department of Energy, Mindanao Electric Power Alliance, Philippine Chamber of Commerce Inc. Mindanao, electric cooperatives, local government units, and civil society organizations.

Establishment of the OSSPC, similar to the one-stop shops of DTI, will help fast-track processing of applications for new generation capacities in Mindanao.

The main goal is to be able to complete setup of small hydro plants within 10 months to one year.

Awarding of service contracts for hydro project applications currently takes years to be processed.

“We should put a timeframe to the application process; maximum should be six months,” said MinDA board member Vicente Lao, president of the Mindanao Energy Power Alliance.

The MinDA board also agreed to conduct a preliminary assessment of the existing process to identify bottlenecks and areas for improvement in the setting up of the OSSPC. 

Recommendations derived from the assessment will be incorporated into the mandate to be issued by Malacañang.