DOE sees no power alert notices in coming weeks

Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Energy (DOE) projected that there would be no power alert notices issued in the coming weeks.

Energy Secretary Alfonso Cusi made this assurance during Thursday’s Senate hearing on power supply shortages.

“Based on the projection of demand, there is no projected alert notice to be issued,” Cusi told the Senate energy panel.

This came after Senator Risa Hontiveros asked energy officials during a Senate hearing on power supply shortages if there will no longer be outages in the near future.

Hontiveros recalled the Senate panel’s call to the DOE, the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC), and other stakeholders to formulate an “urgent” plan of action to avert projected power outages in the coming weeks.

“Are they confident that based on their agreements, and which should be implemented, we will be able to prevent a repeat of the blackouts that we experienced in the past months?” the senator asked.

Luzon recently experienced rotational power interruptions due to thinning energy supply as it was placed under red and yellow alerts.

Cusi reiterated the need for a firm contracted ancillary reserves in order to prevent outages.

“Moving forward, to prevent brownouts, the contracting of firm ancillary reserves is very important,” the energy chief said.

Earlier, Cusi said that firm contracted reserves intend to “provide safety capacity to the grid without reduced inventory” and oblige generation companies to “ensure availability of required power.”

“Hindi po pwede na [It is not right that] we leave it to chance, na kung may [if there’s] excess supply in the market or not,” he added.

Cusi had repeatedly criticized the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) for its supposed non-compliance with its concession agreement required to secure “firm” contracts for ancillary services that would provide on-call, backup energy supply whenever needed.

“It has to be there. Kailangan po nandyan lagi. ‘Di po natin pwedeng isaalang alang sa chance. So kailangan po ma-contract agad ang firm,” Cusi went on.

(The reserves has to be there. We always need available reserves. We can’t leave it to chance so there’s really a need to contract firm ancillary reserves.)

“We have issued the advisory and we are working with the ERC, [they] are coordinating closely with the NGCP,” he added.

JPV