Manila Electric Co. on Monday warned Luzon will face tight power supply until 2018, because of aging power plants and the anticipated increase in electricity demand.
Meralco said it foresaw as early as 2013 the impending power supply shortage in 2015, which the government initially denied.
“What had not been evident before that came to light is really the effect of aging power plants. The phenomenon, not being there, [but] we expected them to be, became evident last quarter of 2013,” Meralco president Oscar Reyes said.
Power rates surged in the fourth quarter of 2013, following the Malampaya natural gas facility shutdown, coupled with the outage of several power plants.
Meralco recorded 83 forced outages or an average of seven outages per month and 52 scheduled outages in 2014.
Reyes said the country’s economic growth put pressure on the aging and inadequate power generation structure in the Luzon grid, resulting in increasing forced outages and longer scheduled shutdown of power plants.
“We are in a tight situation. I think recently there have been renewed warnings potential for brownouts. We still have to see latest reviews, how much forced outages you assume,” Reyes said.
He said the power supply projection would depend on whether the new power plants would be completed in time.
Power plants usually take three years to five years to build, including the permitting period, but are often delayed due to regulatory issues.
Among the power plants that are expected to be online this year are the 135-megawatt coal plant of Trans-Asia Oil and Energy Development Corp. and Ayala Corp. and the 150-MW Calaca coal plant of Sem-Calaca Power Corp. and other renewable energy projects.