Manila Electric Co. said Monday the average electricity rate in its franchise will go down by P0.0746 per kilowatt-hour in January on lower generation charges from power plants.
Meralco said the adjustment means the overall rate for a typical household will decrease to P9.7027 per kWh from December’s P9.7773 per kWh. This is equivalent to a reduction of around P15 in the total bill of residential customers consuming 200 kWh a month.
Meralco said the lower generation charge dragged down overall electricity rates.
The generation charge in January decreased P0.1081 per kWh to P5.4262 per kWh from last month’s P5.5343 per kWh on the back of lower costs from supply agreements and independent power producers that more than offset the higher charges from the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market.
PSA and IPP rates registered reductions of P0.4375 and P0.0543 per kWh, respectively. The higher share of excess energy deliveries of AC Energy plants and lower coal prices contributed to the reductions.
PSAs and IPPs accounted for 46.5 percent and 41.3 percent of Meralco’s energy requirement, respectively.
Charges from WESM, the trading floor of electricity, increased by P0.8511 per kWh, brought about by higher average capacity on outage in the Luzon grid.
Damage from Typhoon Odette and the continued Malampaya gas supply restriction also contributed to the grid’s tight supply condition. The share of WESM this month was lower at 12.2 percent.
Transmission charges for residential customers increased P0.0728 per kWh, on higher ancillary service charges. Meanwhile, taxes and other charges registered a net reduction of P0.0393 per kWh.
Meralco also continued the implementation of the Distribution Rate True-Up refund which began in March 2021 to temper the overall movement of rates. The refund rate for residential customers is at P0.2761 per kWh.
The Energy Regulatory Commission provisionally approved Meralco’s proposal to refund around P13.9 billion over a period of 24 months or until the amount is fully refunded. This amount represented the difference between the actual weighted average tariff and the ERC-approved interim average rate for distribution-related charges for the period July 2015 to November 2020.