POWER generators committed yesterday to increase their supply so Cebu will have less or, hopefully, no more brownouts by next week, Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia said yesterday.
Garcia called for a meeting with power stakeholders at the Capitol yesterday to discuss what can be done regarding the rotating brownouts hitting Cebu this week.
The governor said there were commitments from Cebu Energy Development Corp. (CEDC), SPC Power Corp., Korean Electric Co. (Kepco) and Green Core Corp. to increase power generation.
“We have a very optimistic picture and we do believe that these second deliverables (power) will be delivered. We are saying that by next week, the power situation will stabilize. We will have less brownouts, hopefully, or even no more brownouts,” Garcia said.
Garcia said each of the power stakeholders was able to give a presentation—from the power generation, to the transmission and the distribution utility, handled by Visayan Electric Co. (Veco).
She said in a meeting during the first quarter this year, there was a projected increase in demand at eight to nine percent.
“But at present, it’s more than that, probably because of the El Niño phenomenon. The demand increased and Cebu alone is accounting for 50, 60 and 70 percent of the peak demand,” Garcia said.
There could be less brownouts during the onset of the rainy season.
“We are also looking hopefully to an end to this El Niño phenomenon, that the rainy days will start to reduce the heat, which will also reduce the demand for air-conditioning and other equipment for air cooling, like electric fans and coolers,” Garcia said.
She said more power sources will be put up until the last quarter of this year. CEDC and Kepco are expected to synchronize with the Visayas grid by Nov. 1.
However, this does not mean the total 200 megawatts (mw) of power that Kepco will produce will immediately be made available.
“We are looking at, hopefully, by the middle part of January (2011 for the 200 mw to be fully supplied by Kepco). So, from now until then, we are hoping that the (existing) plants that were shut down will resume operations,” Garcia said.
She is also hoping the two 84-mw plants of CEDC in Toledo city will be fully operational.
Meanwhile, the Cebu City Council wants the Department of Energy (DOE) to double its efforts in promoting energy conservation and energy efficiency.
The council also asked officials of DOE, Veco and some Independent Power Producers (IPP) to appear before the body next week and brief them on why “in this time of emergency,” they are not producing enough power.
“It seems there are some independent power producers that have the capability to supply power to Veco but are not doing so now because the power rates approved by the ERC (Energy Regulatory Commission) for them are too low and they will be operating at a loss,” said Councilor Sylvan Jakosalem in a text message sent to Sun.Star Cebu.
Last Monday, Veco had to implement two-hour rotating brownouts within its franchise area because of the high power supply deficiency in the Cebu-Negros-Panay (CNP) grid.
Jakosalem, who chairs the council’s committee on energy, said he finds the outages alarming since businesses and the general public have been “badly inconvenienced.”
“This act must be seriously investigated and should not be allowed to continue. IPPs who refuse to generate power should be stripped of their franchises if they have given franchises already,” he said.
“We want to know why they (IPP) are not producing power because this is time of emergency…You know they are given a franchise with the national government to produce power so they should be obliged, they should be ordered to produce power,” he added.
Cebu City Police Office (CCPO) Director Patrocinio Comendador Jr. said the brownouts in the city did not only bring inconvenience but has greatly affected the productivity of the police.
He said police officers had to wait for the power to be restored before they can encode or print affidavits and other needed documents.
Last Monday, the command conference of the city police officials was delayed for two hours because of the brownout.
Emergency lights, though, have been set up inside the operations section and in the strategic areas inside the headquarters.
Of the 11 police stations, only the Guadalupe Police Station, under Senior Insp. Mario Monilar, has a portable generator, which is enough to provide lights to the entire police station.
Meanwhile, Councilor Nestor Archival wants DOE to promote energy conservation and efficiency by developing and implementing the use of clean energy and exploring creative options in promoting renewable energy.
“The generation of electric power produces more pollution than any other single industry, hence the pollution is changing the planet’s climate and ecosystem in ways that will harm generations to come,” Archival said in his resolution.