ILOILO City – A congressional investigation into the blackout affecting Panay Island, Guimaras and parts of Negros Occidental is being pushed.
In a statement issued on Wednesday morning, this city’s Mayor Jerry Treñas urged lawmakers to take action, noting that it was both the Senate and the House of Representatives that gave a franchise to the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP).
NGCP is a privately-owned corporation that the national government tasked to operate, maintain and develop the country’s state-owned power grid, an interconnected system that transmits gigawatts of power at thousands of volts from where it is made to where it is needed.
The blackouts commenced on Panay Island and Guimaras at 2:19 p.m. on Jan.2, with voltage fluctuations also occurring in parts of Negros Occidental and Bacolod City. This situation led the Central Negros Electric Cooperative, Inc. (CENECO) and Northern Negros Electric Cooperative, Inc. (NONECO) to announce rotational brownouts on Tuesday night.
“I am calling our congressmen to initiate a congressional investigation on the power interruptions in Panay, Guimaras and Negros. The NGCP, holding a franchise from Congress, should be held accountable,” said Treñas.
He also urged the Department of Energy to find a sustainable solution to power supply concerns.
Iloilo City’s Cong. Julienne Baronda expressed support to the call for a congressional inquiry.
“Power outages warrant scrutiny by the House of Representatives to safeguard public welfare,” she stressed.
Baronda recalled that a congressional investigation was conducted after the April 2023 region-wide power outages, and emphasized the need for lasting solutions to energy issues affecting Western Visayas.
In a statement yesterday, NGCP blamed power generators for the blackout.
“The unscheduled maintenance shutdowns of the largest power plants in Panay Island was the primary cause of the power interruption. We emphasize the need for improved planning to ensure sufficient generation per island, with a well-balanced mix of fuels and technology,” NGCP said.
In an earlier statement, NGCP reported that various power plants in Panay Island suffered multiple trippings on Jan. 2, including Panay Energy Development Corp.’s (PEDC) Unit 1 and 2 (83 megawatts each), and Palm Concepcion Power Corporation (PCPC, 135MW), among others.
It said that with the tripping of three of the largest power generating units and the planned maintenance shutdown of PEDC Unit 3 (150MW), 451MW or 68.75% of the total 656MW in-island generation was lost to the Panay sub-grid.
NGCP insisted that maintenance shutdowns and deration of plants outside the Department of Energy’s (DOE) approved Grid Operating and Maintenance Program also contributed to the lack of power supply.
As of noon on Wednesday, Jan. 3, the NGCP reported that Panay power plants were supplying only 210.8 megawatts. The NGCP advisory stated that load restoration would be done conservatively to prevent voltage failures and that they were ready to transmit power once available.
NGCP underscored the need to conduct a more robust resource optimization planning by policymakers, to ensure that solutions to power system concerns are approached from all angles, and the most efficient ones prioritized.
Given the configuration of the Panay sub-grid and its dependency on variable energy sources in Negros when it loses internally generated power, NGCP also noted the need to provide sufficient non-variable sources to stabilize the system. The company also included its Cebu-Negros-Panay Stage 3 project (CNP3) as a contributing solution.
NGCP strongly recommended the review of the Philippine Grid Code to cater to renewable energy sources, particularly the effective use of emerging technologies such as energy storage systems, among others./PN
