Residential consumers in southern Negros will see higher electricity bills this month, driven primarily by a sharp surge in market prices following the resumption of the spot market.
The Negros Occidental Electric Cooperative (NOCECO) announced on Friday, June 19, that its total residential electricity rate for June 2026 has been set at Php 12.3656 per kWh, reflecting a net increase of Php 0.9146 per kWh from May.
According to the cooperative, the primary driver for the adjustment is the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) rate, which soared to Php 7.4098 per kWh—a steep Php 2.9895 increase—after the market suspension was lifted in May.
“While transmission charges saw a slight decrease, it was unfortunately not enough to offset the broader generation and fuel spikes currently impacting the entire Visayas grid,” NOCECO said in a statement.
The cooperative noted that the price hike coincides with a natural rise in household consumption due to ongoing humid weather. To prevent a massive bill shock, NOCECO management negotiated a deferred payment scheme to absorb the full impact of the market spikes, NOCECO said.
Without this intervention, the actual overall rate increase would have been higher by around Php 3.5535 per kWh, pushing the full WESM-derived rate to approximately Php 13.7744 per kWh if implemented all at once, it added.
“To mitigate this heavy burden, we negotiated a staggered payment schedule with IEMOP (Independent Electricity Market Operator of the Philippines), implementing only a portion on this month’s billing and spreading the remaining balance over the next two months to strike a critical balance between rate relief and cooperative stability,” NOCECO explained.
With external market pressures and rate volatilities expected to persist in the coming months, the power utility assured the public that it remains fully committed to transparency.
NOCECO encouraged consumers to adopt energy-saving measures at home to help manage electricity costs.*
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