Senate demands Cusi to explain power outages

Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi. (File photo from the Philippine Daily Inquirer)

MANILA, Philippines — The Senate energy committee will press Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi to explain the series of power outages that hit Luzon despite his earlier reassurances of uninterrupted supply during the rollout of the vaccine program, the panel chair said on Sunday.

“We will really take [Cusi] to task for that because first of all, we hold him to his word. He leads the agency that is in charge of electricity, so we give weight to his every statement. We will hold him to his word,” Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian said in a radio interview.

The Senate energy panel is planning on Wednesday to open an inquiry into the country’s energy situation amid fears that brownouts may hamper the government’s COVID-19 vaccination program, as the jabs require varying levels of refrigeration.

Shelf life of vaccines

Gatchalian said his panel would look into how the Department of Energy (DOE) wrongly analyzed data and failed to take steps to avert fluctuations at a time when a brownout could affect the shelf life of COVID-19 vaccines.

“If they cannot fix how they analyze data and they keep issuing incorrect statements, how can we have any confidence in the Department of Energy?” Gatchalian said in Filipino.

Assurance from Cusi

Cusi and other DOE officials gave assurance to senators in an April 27 hearing that there would be no brownouts during the vaccine rollout.

But Gatchalian said many were shocked when the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines forecast eight days of a power deficit in Luzon on May 31, forcing power distributors like Manila Electric Co. to resort to rotating brownouts.

“We only got lucky because a storm came in, so the weather cooled down. But if [the dry season] continued, I’m sure we’d still be experiencing brownouts now,” he said.

At the House of Representatives, Deputy Minority Leader Carlos Zarate also demanded that the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) hasten its investigation of the power outages.

Agnes Devanadera, the ERC chair, told a House energy hearing on Friday that some 35 power generation companies had been warned against noncompliance with the government’s policy of “no maintenance” during summer, but only 15 have complied.

Zarate said Calaca Unit 2 and the Sual Unit 2 plants allowed unplanned outages of only 16.8 days, but have reached 113 days.