Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri and Senator Grace Poe on Wednesday, May 3, called for long term solutions to ensure stable power supply in Western Visayas.
While Senator Raffy Tulfo deplored the sky-high and soaring generation charge of energy generation companies (gencos) despite the drop in prices of coal in the global price index.
The Department of Energy (DOE) and the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) must step up and answer for the blackouts that hit Western Visayas last week, Zubiri said.
“These are no longer just an inconvenience. They are a major problem, affecting the economy and endangering the wellbeing of our people,” he said.
The frequency of these blackouts is alarming, and it is on the DOE and the NGCP to get their act straight and find long-term solutions already, Zubiri said.
A few minutes of power interruption every once in a while is understandable, but frequent outages that last for hours and hours and cause loss of income is unforgivable. The DOE and the NGCP must answer to consumers, he said.
“If they find that we need to amend the the EPIRA (Electric Power Industry Reform Act), then we are open to that. The law is over two decades old, and can definitely be improved to help the power sector serve consumers better, and to help prevent recurring region-wide blackouts like this,” Zubiri said.
The Senate has received the administration’s suggested amendments to the EPIRA, and they are already studying how these amendments can be further refined to best respond to the problems, he said.
“But the DOE and the NGCP must still come forward with a clear explanation behind the blackouts, and more importantly, outline a solution. We cannot let this be the norm. Our people deserve better than this kind of service”, Zubiri said.
Poe also sought an inquiry into the power interruption plaguing Panay Island for years to identify measures that would ensure continuous supply to consumers.
In filing Senate Resolution No. 579, Poe said it is time to put in place a long-term solution to the power woes which have been severely impacting on the daily lives of residents and economic activities in the region.
“Recurring power interruptions and massive blackouts should not be a way of life,” she said.
“Concerned agencies must get a handle on the problem to end the intolerable suffering of the residents,” she added.
Poe stressed the need to determine the root cause of the grid disturbances reported by the NGCP allegedly due to the tripping of distribution utilities.
At the same time, the inquiry should delve into the position of electric cooperatives in Panay and Negros pointing to the NGCP as the cause of the problem, she added.
“There is also a need to look into the long-term solutions to the power interruptions and outages within the backdrop of the ‘thin’ supply of power in the Visayas grid,” she added.
Tulfo said coal prices in the global market have been plummeting but the charges of generation companies remain high in the Philippines, allowing big gencos supplying electricity in the country to earn hundreds of millions, to even billions, daily.
In fact, of the reasons why many foreign investors are hesitant to set up their business in the Philippines, Tulfo noted, is because of the expensive electricity cost. In turn, these foreign investors prefer to go to other countries with cheaper electricity charges, such as Malaysia and Vietnam.
Tulfo said that DOE promised that they are ready to impose necessary sanctions to uncompliant gencos, which includes obliging the latter to give their customers a refund.
“We will get back to ERC and DOE through a Senate public to finally put a stop to the abuse of gencos to Filipino consumers,” he added.
Meanwhile, the Bacolod Sangguniang Panlungsod approved a resolution authored by Councilor Claudio Puentevella on Wednesday requesting the Central Negros Electric Cooperative to furnish the SP a report on the causes and action taken on the series of power interruptions and outages in April.*