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THE
extreme summer heat has caused households, businesses
and industries to put on higher settings their air
conditioning units, causing demand to outpace power
supply and power agencies to scramble to fill temporary
generation shortfalls.
Residential, commercial and industrial customers were
seen affected by rotating power outages arising from a
generation deficiency of 450 megawatts for Meralco.
Transco, or the National Transmission Corp.,earlier on
Wednesday declared a system red alert at 8 a.m. in the
Luzon Grid due to lack of system reserve.
Still,
the state-run National Power Corp. (Napocor) said the
power situation in the Luzon Grid has begun to
normalize, following a manual load dropping in some
areas in the island.
Napocor
president Cyril C. del Callar assured the public that
the power sector can deal with further spikes in demand,
even as government meteorologists said this week’s
record temperatures could worsen in May, when summer is
seen to end with a sizzle before the rainy season
begins.
He also
warned about factors that might really affect supply of
fuel for Napocor-run plants and IPPs such as the
increase in demand in China. “We may have problems in
procuring our fuel requirements as the demand grows.
Other countries, not only China, have also started to
import fuel needs, such as
India. We
have already managed our supply needs, and we may also
consider hedging or getting short-term contracts to
ensure supply.”
Del
Callar said the state-run power company noted an
extraordinary peak in demand on Tuesday that increased
to as a high as 200 megawatts.
For
Luzon, the Napocor head said they projected only a
6,400-megawatt during summer months that normally starts
every May of each year.
“However, the demand had peaked at an unusual level of
6,630 megawatts on Tuesday. While we had expected the
demand to increase by May, the surge in demand came
early,” said
del Callar.
Napocor,
along with Transco and distribution utilities such as
Meralco, said they are now addressing the current
shortfall in generation due to the temporary tripping of
the 270-megawatt Bataan Combined Cycle Power Plant (BCCPP)
in Limay, Bataan, among others.
Napocor
said the BCCPP experienced minor equipment trouble early
at 10 a.m. Wednesday.
Del
Callar said Napocor had managed to normalize the power
situation in a span of two hours after Tuesday’s spike
in demand. Per Transco’s projections, the manual load
dropping could have lasted for four hours or longer.
“We
responded as soon as we can [so] that it lasted only for
two hours; we were able to put online the 270-megawatt
Malaya thermal plant, which was supported by Module 10
unit of the 1,000-megawatt Sta. Rita gas-fired power
that went on line a few minutes after the supposed
rotating brownouts,” del Callar said.
“We
would like to assure our customers and the consuming
public that we are now addressing this minor setback in
our power supply. Likewise, we wish to express our
apologies for any inconvenience that the incident may
have caused,” del Callar said.
Napocor
has on stand-by other power plants, pending
synchronization with the Transco transmission lines and
distribution lines. At press time, power was being
brought back to affected areas. The BCCPP in Limay was
back on-line since 12 noon Wednesday.
“We
expect to have full power supply restored to these areas
later this afternoon or early this evening,” Napocor
said.
Industry
officials speculated that Bauang’s technical problem was
caused by not having enough supply of fuel (diesel)
needed to generate electricity.
Del
Callar denied such allegations, saying Napocor has
already purchased all of its supply requirements for the
year, particularly bunker fuel and coal even in the last
quarter of 2006.
“We do
not have fuel supply problem. And this power situation
was just an offshoot of the sudden increase in demand
due to the extreme heat,” he said.
“In
2006, the highest demand for electricity was experienced
in May. Yesterday, April 17, 2007, the demand rose
significantly by 200-megawatt over the forecasted
6,400-megawatt for the period. We are now utilizing all
available power plants, including those running on coal,
natural gas and diesel, to address the situation. We are
also making sure that these power plants are running
reliably and efficiently,” Napocor said.
It will
continue to provide updates on the power situation later
this week.
Meralco
said that the Manual Load Dropping scheduled on
Wednesday temporarily ended at 12:30 p.m., due to the
cutting-in of Sta. Rita Module 10 and the diversion of
coal intended for Cebu to the Pagbilao plant.
Meralco
Vice President for Corporate Communication Elpi O. Cuna
said the system is still on red alert due to power
reserve problems.
Cuna
said that based on information from Transco, if the
forecast demand of 6650 megawatts is realized by 1 PM,
the manual load dropping will resume from
1 p.m. to 3
p.m.. |
