WESTERN Visayas cannot build a 21st-century economy on an electricity system that keeps blinking on and off.
That is the unpleasant truth behind the Regional Development Council’s push for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to declare a state of energy emergency in Western Visayas. Persistent power interruptions, yellow and red alerts, and rotational brownouts have reached the point where regional officials fear they could undermine the region’s economic growth.
The proposed declaration should therefore be viewed not merely as a response to brownouts but as a warning about the economic future of Western Visayas.
Electricity is no longer simply a household utility. It is economic infrastructure.
Factories cannot maintain production without reliable power. Restaurants, hotels, malls, hospitals and offices cannot operate efficiently when electricity becomes unpredictable. Micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), which often cannot afford sophisticated backup systems, suffer even more. Every interruption can mean lost sales, spoiled goods, interrupted production and additional expenses for generators and fuel.
As Iloilo City’s Mayor Raisa Treñas pointed out, the consequences have already gone beyond inconvenience. Families, transportation and MSMEs are being affected, while some businesses cannot continue production and face rising operating costs.
That should alarm policymakers.
Western Visayas has spent years positioning itself as an increasingly attractive destination for investment, tourism, property development, outsourcing and other industries. But economic expansion inevitably brings higher electricity demand. Infrastructure must grow ahead of that demand, not scramble desperately to catch up after shortages appear.
The Department of Energy has presented interventions. A battery energy storage facility capable of providing up to 265 megawatts is expected to become operational in Iloilo, while three power barges with a combined capacity of up to 120 MW are expected to enter the Visayas by December 2026 or the first quarter of 2027. But even Energy Secretary Sharon Garin acknowledges that they are expected only to reduce, rather than completely eliminate, yellow and red alerts. Additional generating plants are considered the more durable solution, with new facilities under development expected to become operational by 2028.
And therein lies the problem.
Western Visayas cannot spend the next two years merely hoping the grid holds.
Emergency measures must buy time, but that time must be used aggressively to build lasting energy security. Government, generators, distribution utilities, electric cooperatives and local governments must stop treating generation, transmission, storage and distribution as separate concerns. A power system is only as dependable as its weakest component.
More importantly, the region must pursue an energy policy designed around where Western Visayas wants its economy to be five, 10 and 20 years from now—not merely around today’s consumption.
Garin has articulated an ambitious objective: Panay should eventually become energy self-sufficient instead of depending on electricity transmitted from Luzon, Mindanao or Cebu.
That ambition deserves support, but it must be converted into generating capacity, transmission infrastructure, storage facilities and firm deadlines.
If an emergency declaration can accelerate those investments, remove bureaucratic bottlenecks and mobilize coordinated government action, then it must produce more than another resolution and another round of meetings.
Investors may forgive one blackout. Businesses may survive several. Consumers may endure repeated inconvenience. But chronic energy insecurity eventually extracts a price — in lost productivity, higher operating costs, weakened investor confidence and opportunities that quietly go somewhere else.
Western Visayas is growing. Its power system must grow with it.
