House delays grant of emergency powers to Noy

MANILA, Philippines - The House of Representatives is delaying the grant of emergency powers to President Aquino that will enable him to deal with a projected electricity shortage in Luzon next summer.

The chamber opted to first inquire into the basis of Aquino’s request for such special authority.

Yesterday, it directed its energy committee “to conduct an inquiry, in aid of legislation, on the need to establish additional generating capacity to ensure the energy requirements of the country.”

The directive is contained in Resolution 1533, authored by Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. and Majority Leader Neptali Gonzales ll.

“There is a need for the House to be provided with the necessary, relevant and sufficient information on the actual or projected requirements needed to ensure the energy requirements of the country, in view of the identified circumstances contributing to the critical electricity situation in the summer months of 2015,” the two House leaders said in their resolution.

They said Aquino has asked for special authority to address the forecast shortfall “through a specific, focused and targeted acquisition of additional energy capacities for use during the limited periods of time of very tight energy supply.”

They said the expected effects of El Niño extended dry season, continuing outages of power plants and delay in the commissioning of committed power projects, among other factors, would contribute to the shortage.

Gonzales said the energy committee chaired by Mindoro Oriental Rep. Reynaldo Umali would conduct hearings during the congressional recess, which starts this weekend.

Isabela Rep. Rodolfo Albano lll, a member of the minority bloc, said he supports the decision of the majority to first inquire into the sufficiency of the basis for granting the President’s request for special authority.

“Let us make sure that there will be shortage, which cannot be filled from sources other than contracting power from foreign suppliers as proposed by the Department of Energy (DOE),” he said.

He said if the electricity to be made available from the so-called interruptible loan program (ILP) to household users would be sufficient, “then let us not use the option being pushed by the DOE.”

The program calls for malls and other big business establishments to use their generators to free up energy for small users.

Albano pointed out that the DOE formula would cost consumers and taxpayers between P6 billion and P12 billion over two years, even if they do not get to use the electricity that it would add to the Luzon grid.

“This arrangement has a take-or-pay feature, which means we have to pay for the contracted power whether it is used or not,” he added.

Umali said big business establishments with generators should participate in ILP.

“To date, there is about 589.5MW potential power from the ILP. I am very positive that voluntary participation will increase at this time of crisis,” he said.

He said it is not right that people would spend up to P12 billion for contracted power that would be used only for seven weeks at two to three hours a day.

He added that ILP participants would be helping the people and the government save this huge amount.

For their part, Bayan Muna Representatives Neri Colmenares and Carlos Zarate said the electricity demand-supply figures submitted by Energy Secretary Jericho Petilla are unreliable.

“In the energy committee hearings, we will request all the owners and operators of power plants in Luzon to submit a detailed report on their installed and dependable capacities and their availability.

We also want a detailed report on the complete status of each plant as well as their scheduled shutdowns. We want groups that are suggesting alternative approaches other than the use of emergency powers to present their position,” they said.