Arroyo, past prexies hit over power crisis

DAVAO CITY -- A senatorial aspirant slammed the present and past governments for neglecting investments on the country’s energy resources resulting to the present power crisis in Luzon and Mindanao.

Ilocos Governor Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr., who is seeking a senatorial seat, criticized the Arroyo government and former presidents since 1987 for giving less priority on the country's power resources particularly in Mindanao.

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The power situation in Mindanao has been critical since a few years back due to the consistently growing demand on the power supply yet there have been no new investments in power plants, said Marcos.

"This has been going on for years, and we all know that to put up a power plant will take years," Marcos said.

Mindanao is experiencing a power supply gap of about 510 megawatts (MW) based on the latest update of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP).

But the power shortage problem is not limited to Mindanao as Luzon also suffered outages after more power plants went offline due to effects of the El Niño phenomenon.

As of 5 a.m. Thursday, the NGCP reported that Luzon posted a generation deficiency of 446 MW while Mindanao’s insufficiency hit 650 MW.

Marcos said the power outages will seriously affect the economy of the country if it will not be resolved immediately.

Worsening by the day

Power generation in Mindanao has reduced by the day and starting Thursday, the Davao Light and Power Corporation (DLPC) imposed a two-hour rotating brownout from what used to be just an hour.

Water level in Lake Lanao, the primary source of hydro electric power in Mindanao, has gone down below the 699.08-meter critical level as of March 1, 2010.

Once the water level breaches the critical level, National Power Corporation’s (Napocor) six hydro power plants -- the Agus Hydro Power Plants -- will be shutdown.

NGCP noted that the shortage was compounded further by the outage of the Magat hydroelectric plant owned by the Aboitiz Power Corporation.

Magat was running at 30 MW Wednesday but due to low water reservoir it totally went off line.

Contributory to the supply shortage situation is the CBK hydro plant where only one unit is running.

Mindanao grid situation however was even worse than Luzon after its generation deficiency was placed at 650 MW due to higher demand of 1,361 MW.

NGCP said capacities of hydro-electric power plants continue to be limited in Mindanao due to a very low water inflow to their reservoirs brought about by the dry spell.

Mindanao is suffering from a minimum of five hours to 12 hours brownouts daily, according to the NGCP.

In some areas like in Mati in Davao Oriental, however, brownout had reached up to 24 hours.

Energy crisis

Meanwhile, President Arroyo announced her decision to adopt Department of Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes’s proposal to declare an energy crisis in Mindanao.

Reyes on February 27 submitted a recommendation to the President for her to place Mindanao under a power crisis, which is needed to secure an exemption from the privatization of the power generation business mandated by the Electric Power Industry Restructuring Act (Epira) of 2001.

This would enable government to adopt measures that would generate more power for the Mindanao like the operation, leasing or putting up of new power generating plants.

“Upon the determination by the President of the Philippines of an imminent shortage of the supply of electricity, Congress may authorize, through a joint resolution, the establishment of additional generating capacity under such terms and conditions as it may approve” he said, citing Section 71 or the electric power crisis provision of Epira.

This means the government could also lease or purchase generator sets (gensets) and barges or negotiate of short-term power supply contracts to increase the generating capacity of Mindanao.

Reyes proposed the leasing or rental of 160 MW gensets; the operation and maintenance of the Alsons Corporation’s 30 MW Iligan Diesel Power Plant 1 (IDPP); entering into an operation and maintenance agreement with Alsons Corporation for the 70 MW IDPP2; and entering into a contract on an additional five MW from Southern Philippines Power Corporation - which is jointly owned by Aboitiz Equity Ventures, Conal Holdings Corporation, and Tomen Power Corporation of Singapore.

According to him, the cost of these measures was placed by the National Power Corporation at P8 billion to P10 billion, wherein the leasing or rental would depend on the length of the dry spell or until the rainy season starts in July.

Other Energy Source

His father and namesake, the late Ferdinand Marcos, had aggressively pushed for the tapping of renewable and stable sources of energy in the country, creating mega-structures that provided both irrigation for agriculture and hydro electric power plants throughout the country, like the Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP).

"The Bataan Nuclear Power Plant has been mothballed based on a political reason. It is not technical and scientific," the young Marcos said.

The administrations that took over after the 1986 Edsa revolt impeded the nuclear power plant’s operation despite its capacity to generate over 600 MW.

"A problem like the power crisis should be resolved and addressed in a technical and scientific manner, as it is a technical and scientific problem," Marcos added.

One of the actions eyed by the government is to tap the power barges in order to ensure the stable supply of power in key areas of Mindanao.

"It is a bullet that we have to bite. There is no other cheap solution for this. Yes, it will be expensive but it will be more expensive if we start losing our economy," Marcos said.

In his home province of Ilocos Norte, a windmill farm has been put up to provide a stable supply of power in the area, which is at the end of the Luzon grid.

"Being at the end, our power supply was fluctuating, and the investors did not want that as it will damage their machines," said Marcos.

Meanwhile, the Liberal Party standard bearer Senator Noynoy Aquino has declared that he will look into the feasibility of expanding the use geothermal energy in the country.

Aquino prefers to develop the use of renewable energy such as solar and geothermal rather than nuclear energy because of technological constraints.

“I’d like to preserve an open mind to the BNPP but I’m heavily biased against opening it as a nuclear plant. We have sources of energy solar, geothermal and now we have good ecological program. I will look at the nuclear power industry I am not certain we are ready to embark on it,” Aquino said.

Aquino's opposition on nuclear energy arises from his concern about the possible dangers of its by-products.

The presidential bet said the Philippines should be the world's largest producer of geothermal energy. It is now the second largest producer with 1,900 MW of installed geothermal energy.

At the moment, there are geothermal power plants in Sorsogon in Luzon, Negros Occidental and Leyte in the Visayas, and Cotabato in Mindanao. (Carlo P. Mallo/Angela Casauay/Sunnex)