Bacolod folk assured power woes to end

AUGMENTATION WORK A power line from a feeder in Murcia, Negros Occidental, to the Alijis Feeder 3 in Bacolod City is being installed on Aug. 22 by the Negros Electric and Power Corp. (NEPC) as part of measures being undertaken to augment power supply in areas affected by outages since Aug. 21 due to a busted transformer. —Photo courtesy of NEPC

BACOLOD CITY, NEGROS OCCIDENTAL, Philippines — The power provider here has assured that electricity in areas served by the Alijis substation that went down because of a busted transformer will be back to normal by Tuesday, Aug. 27.

“This (power situation) will normalize in the sense that all of those 47,000 affected customers are going on a manual load dropping. By Tuesday, that should be over,” said Roel Castro, president and CEO of the Negros Electric and Power Corp. (NEPC).

Rotational brownouts were being implemented in some areas in Bacolod after a 37-megavolt ampere (MVA) power transformer at the Alijis substation went out on Aug. 21.

The damaged transformer triggered widespread power outages across seven feeders and affected about 47,000 consumers.

Castro said they linked the seven Alijis feeders to other substations to temporarily deliver power to the affected areas.

On schedule

A 10-MVA mobile substation from Iloilo and an 18-MVA new power transformer were already stationed and installed at the compound of the Alijis substation.

Castro said electrical testing is being conducted from the 69-kilovolt transmission line of the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines and the 3-phase automatic circuit reclosers to the Alijis Feeder 3 and other feeders.

“It is expected to be finished by Monday evening, and the required load of power will be supplied to energize all the consumers of the Alijis substation so that no more rotational brownouts will be needed,” he said.

Castro said the Alijis substation is part of the substations programmed for rehabilitation under the five-year rehabilitation plan of NEPC.

“We are doing something out of the ordinary, and our priority is to restore the power to all the consumers. I know the consumers will not be satisfied with this, but please give us the benefit of the doubt,” Castro said.

Water supply

To ease the inconveniences faced by consumers affected by the deficiency in power supply, NEPC also provided three generator sets to the pumping stations of the Bacolod City Water District.

These pumping stations, connected to Alijis Feeder 3, lacked power generator sets essential for sustaining water supply during rotational brownouts, said NEPC spokesperson Jonathan Cabrera.

Bacolod Mayor Alfredo Abelardo Benitez, in a statement, said the local government will continue to work closely with NEPC to implement immediate solutions and ensure long-term infrastructure improvements for the benefit of all residents.

“We acknowledge the recent updates from Negros Power regarding their efforts to normalize the power supply to the Alijis substation,” he said.

“Negros Power has committed to rehabilitating and upgrading our power infrastructure—a crucial step toward ensuring the reliable delivery of electricity to Bacolod City. Rest assured, the city government is doing everything within its capacity to expedite the resolution of these issues and ensure a more reliable power supply for everyone,” he added.