Napocor seeks forex rate adjustment

By Danessa Rivera (The Philippine Star) | Updated February 19, 2018 - 12:00am

http://old.philstar.com/business/2018/02/19/1789087/napocor-seeks-forex-rate-adjustment

MANILA, Philippines — The National Power Corp. (Napocor) wants to recover over P17 million from customers in missionary areas for the foreign exchange costs incurred in the delivery of power to off-grid areas.

In a filing with the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC), Napocor is seeking the approval of its 17th application for incremental currency exchange rate adjustment (ICERA).

ICERA seeks to recover costs on foreign exchange rate fluctuations, which affects the costs of servicing foreign currency debts and/or foreign exchange-related expenses such as insurance and imported power plant/transmission parts. 

Napocor is seeking back P17.66 million of deferred fuel costs it incurred from January to December 2016.

The amount includes the “deferred debt service, operating expenses and the corresponding carrying charges for Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.”

“The proposed ICERA is based on foreign exchange-related adjustments attributable  only to NPC-SPUG  (Small Power Utilities Group) operations, i.e. excluding those associated with

This proposed recovery will translate to an additional charge of P0.0243 per kilowatt-hour (kwh) in the monthly bills of end-consumers in missionary areas.

“Since these expenses were incurred in the year 2016 immediate recovery of this adjustment through a provisional authority would help alleviate the operational funding of applicant, without prejudice to the authority of the Honorable Commission to approve the recovery of this adjustment as part of the applicant’s True Cost Generation Rate (TCGR),” Napocor said.

Napocor is the national government’s arm for missionary electrification as mandated by the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001, which is done through its 275 SPUG power facilities scattered all over the country.

This year, the state-run firm said it is acquiring 124 generator sets (gensets) worth as much as P1.3 billion this year to improve power supply in off-grid islands.

Of the total, 47 gensets worth P554.69 million are for Luzon, 55 gensets costing P433.07 million are for Visayas and 22 gensets amounting to P272.37 million are for Mindanao.