Pangasinan probes power rate hike

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan—The provincial board on Monday has asked the Pangasinan Electric Cooperative (Panelco) III to shed light on the P5.64 power rate increase it implemented last month that has angered its consumers.

In a resolution, the Pangasinan provincial board agreed to invite Panelco III’s manager and board of directors to a “question hour” during its regular session on Jan. 20. Board Members Danilo Uy and Ranjit Shahani authored the resolution.

Uy, whose family operates a piggery farm in Binalonan town, one of the 17 towns within Panelco III’s franchise area, said his electric bill shot up by more than P70,000 last month.

This, he said, was because of the P5.6384-per-kilowatt-hour rate increase that raised Panelco III’s residential rate from P9.80 per kWh in November to P15.40 per kWh last month.

Elenita Bautista, manager of Panelco III’s institutional services department, said the increase in the generation cost was passed on to consumers.

Last month, former Pangasinan State University professor Eusebio Miclat Jr. wrote the Panelco III board to protest the power rate increase, saying it was “unilaterally” implemented without any consideration of its consumers.

Miclat accused the Panelco III board of being “extremely callous and insensitive, onerously thinking of themselves alone without regard for its hard-up member-consumers.”

One-sided contract

Last week, Panelco III consumers asked the electric cooperative’s board of directors to rescind its contract with its power supplier, saying the supplier had violated it.

“The contract is one-sided in favor of the supplier,” said Uy, who was in the meeting.

Businessman Rosendo So said Panelco III’s directors admitted during the meeting that its supplier, GNPower Mariveles Coal Plant Ltd. Co., had failed to supply the contracted 40 megawatts of electricity to the cooperative because of frequent shutdowns.

“Lately, the power supplier [has been] able to give only 20 MW to Panelco III because it had to shut down for repairs,” So said.

“Panelco III had no choice but to buy electricity from the WESM (wholesale electricity spot market) at a very expensive [rate],” he said.

The WESM was established by the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001. It is where power distributors buy the power they need.

So said the Panelco III board also told them that under the contract, the supplier was allowed to have shutdowns for only 51 days. “They already had shutdowns for almost 65 days. This is a clear breach of contract, so we asked the board to review and rescind it,” he said.

So said it was time for Panelco III to get its power supply from companies offering cheaper rates, such as San Roque Power Corp. and the firm operating the Sual coal-fired plant, which are both based in Pangasinan province.

He said the other power distributors in Pangasinan, such as Dagupan Electric Corp. (Decorp), Central Pangasinan Electric Cooperative (Cenpelco) and Panelco I, did not have problems with their power rates.

Decorp had announced a P1.98-per-kWh increase last month but it would be implemented on a staggered basis. Cenpelco said it was decreasing its power rate by five centavos and Panelco I did not implement an increase. Gabriel Cardinoza, Inquirer Northern Luzon