Coal plants seen ending Mindanao outages

DAVAO CITY—The National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) said Mindanao’s power woes would be over next year and the island would enjoy more electricity than it could consume.

Maximo Adiong, head of NGCP’s network operations divisions, said the projected surplus power would be brought by the expected operation of at least seven power plants in 2016.

He said the combined output of the Sarangani Coal; Malita (Davao Occidental) Coal Phase 1; Therma South Unit 2; FDC-Misamis Coal Unit 1; FDC-Misamis Coal Unit 2; Malita Coal Phase 2; and FDC-Misamis Coal Unit 3 would be nearly 1,000 megawatts.

Mindanao’s current demand as of Friday was 1,384 MW against the total capacity of 1,399 MW.

“We expect that next year, there won’t be shortage of power supply anymore. In fact, we will have excess power when all of the seven power plants commercially operate,” Adiong said.

But he said the power situation this year would remain critical even with the full-blast operation of Steag’s coal plant in Misamis Oriental province.

Adiong said the frequency of power interruptions would largely depend on the use by power cooperatives of their contracts with independent power producers.

“As long as power cooperatives would activate all their independent power producers, also known as the embedded bilateral contract supply, things would get better for December,” he said.

Adiong said the current supply problem is being caused by the El Niño phenomenon.

The lack of rain, he said, had reduced water level in Lake Lanao and Pulangi in Bukidnon. Hydropower sources account for nearly half of Mindanao’s supply of electricity.

The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration had said the El Niño phenomenon could persist until June 2016. Allan Nawal, Inquirer Mindanao