NGCP denies being behind Naia’s major power outages

MANILA, Philippines — The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) has “categorically denied” accusations of being behind the power issues that affected the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (Naia) twice this year, insisting that their system cannot be controlled remotely.

NGCP said this on Thursday, after Santa Rosa City Rep. Dan Fernandez raised the possibility that China may have caused the stalled operations last January 1 and May 1, by altering how much electricity flows into the airport.

READ: Solon claims China may have a hand in Naia power outages

Fernandez said that NGCP had several Chinese officials, adding that 40 percent of the consortium is handled by the Grid Corporation of China.  As both the January 1 and May 1 power interruptions were related to electricity, Fernandez speculated that China may have been acting up due to the warmer Philippines-United States (US) ties.

“We categorically deny any involvement in what happened to the Naia last May 1 and January 1,” NGCP said in a statement.

“We repeat that our systems operations cannot be controlled remotely, and that the system is by default, disconnected from the VPN and we are protected by an airgap, among many other contingency measures,” it added.

Last January 1, the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) was forced to close the Philippine airspace due to a problem with its Communications, Navigation and Surveillance Systems for Air Traffic Management (CNS/ATM).  Then on May 1, Naia Terminal 3 went powerless due to a supposed fault current.

Both issues were traced to electric concerns.

Fernandez claimed that the January 1 incident happened after US vice president Kamala Harris’ visit to the Philippines last November 2022 to discuss the possible new Enhanced Defense Cooperation Agreement (Edca) sites — which were eventually announced by Malacañang in April 2023.

China has frowned on the establishment of four new Edca sites, saying that it would just harm the Philippines.

READ: China envoy’s Edca warning cites fate of Taiwan OFWs 

NGCP maintained however that they are a Filipino corporation, and that they remain committed to providing electricity to the country.

“We assure everyone that NGCP, a Filipino corporation, is committed to pursuing its mandate of providing world class transmission services,” the corporation said.

Naia Terminal 3’s operations were affected for eight hours on May 1 after a fault current was discovered, affecting at least 9,391 passengers from 1:05 a.m. to 8:46 a.m..

READ: Meralco exec: ‘Fault current’ triggered power outage in Naia Terminal 3 

Meanwhile, the New Year’s Day incident forced all Philippine airports to stop sending out and receiving flights, after its CNS/ATM failed to function.  Authorities said that a cooling blower of its main uninterruptible power supply (UPS) conked out, forcing the airport to rely on backup power.

However, the backup UPS also did not function, prompting technicians to try routing power directly to the CNS/ATM.  But after doing this, the technicians encountered an over voltage, which eventually fried several key satellite components.  The January 1 interruption left over 60,000 passengers stranded.

READ: UPS failure caused glitch at CAAP’s Air Traffic Management Center, says DOTr 

JPV