THE Department of Energy (DOE) assured lawmakers on Thursday that there will be no red or yellow alert issuances for the Luzon grid until the end of the year.
During a Senate hearing, the agency’s power outlook for the rest of the year already took into consideration the scheduled maintenance shutdown of power plants, forced outage of power plants based on average unplanned plant outages for 2018 to 2021, and committed power projects which are ongoing construction or at least secured project financing.
“We have no alert for the rest of the year,” said DOE Undersecretary Mario Marasigan said during the Joint Congressional Energy Commission hearing held on Thursday afternoon.
A yellow alert is issued by the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines when the operating margin is insufficient to meet the grid’s regulating and contingency requirement, which is set at 688MW each.
A red alert, meanwhile, is issued when supply is not enough to meet the demand and the regulating requirement.
The DOE’s rosy projection also took into account the additional capacity coming from Ilijan power plant which partially resumed operation. The DOE said the Ilijan LNG (liquefied natural gas)-fueled power plant has reached a maximum available capacity of 900 megawatts (MW) already.
“The Ilijan facility is not yet in full operation. It’s still in the testing, commissioning of supply. Then we also took into consideration the limitation of some power plants which are also in the testing stage. We also included in our projection the possible outages. If those outages will not happen then the capacity will serve as a buffer,” said Marasigan.
For week 32, or from August 7 to 13, Luzon peak demand was lower by 91MW from the projected 13,125MW for the year.
FIBA, barangay polls
Marasigan said that the DOE power outlook also considered an increase in demand during the FIBA Basketball World Cup next week and the Barangay and Sangguniang Kabataan election in October this year.
“Our available capacity, including the current resumption of operation of Ilijan, will provide ample supply and reserve to the Luzon grid. So, we don’t see any alert, especially with dispatch of ilijan power, as well as timely commissioning of the committed projects. All are reflected there, we have no any alerts for the rest of the year,” added Marasigan.
Meanwhile, the DOE is soliciting comments from industry stakeholders on a draft circular that will prescribe the policy framework for the development of natural gas power generation facilities in Luzon.
Industry stakeholders have until August 24 to submit their comments.