THE Department of Energy (DOE) has assured industry leaders the privatization of the National Power Corp.’s (Napocor) remaining generation assets and contracted capacities would push through, in accordance with the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001.
Energy Secretary Jose Rene Almendras, who also is vice chairman of the Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. (Psalm), said the privatization of the contracted capacity of 131.8 megawatts (MW) will be carried out either next month or in July.
The contracted capacity of the Unified Leyte geothermal complex will also be privatized as soon as Congress resolves a “technical issue” related to the move, he said.
The issue involves the question of how to divide the contract capacity between the two winning bidders without them breaching the 30-percent generation-capacity limit in the Visayas grid.
Private generation companies can only have a generating capacity of 30 percent in a grid and 25 percent of the total generating capacity of the country.
Congress, according to Almendras, is also discussing several proposals on how to handle the Agus-Pulangi hydropower complex in Mindanao.
The remaining generation assets still being held by Psalm include the Power Barges 101-104, the Agus-Pulangi Hydroelectric Power Plant, and the Malaya Thermal Power Plant. The decommissioned plants on its auction list include the Sucat Thermal Power Plant and the Bataan Thermal Power Plant.
The department earlier indicated it was not keen on pushing through with the sale of the Agus-Pulangi power plants.
Psalm, on the other hand, has yet to bid out the contracted capacities of the 131.8-MW Naga power plant, the 559-MW Unified Leyte geothermal capacities, 728 MW Caliraya-Botokan-Kalayaan hydro plants, 100 MW Western Mindanao Power Corp., 50 MW Southern Philippines Power Corp., 200-MW Mindanao Coal plant, 92.52 MW Mount Apo 1 and 2 geothermal project and 165-MW Casecnan hydropower plant.
But Conrad Tolentino, Psalm vice president for asset management and electricity trading, gave assurances that Psalm would pursue the privatization as mandated in the Epira of 2001, and consistent with the direction provided by the PSALM board and the policies set by the DOE.
To date, Psalm has already privatized 91.73 percent of Napocor’s generation assets in the Luzon and Visayas grids, and 68 percent of Napocor’s contracted capacities to independent power producer administrators. Psalm, on the other hand, has already generated $3.467 billion from the sale of the generating assets and $3.23 billion from the IPP contracts.
