DOE power supply plan for Mindanao backed

Business Mirror
THURSDAY, 22 MARCH 2012 20:12 BUTCH FERNANDEZ / REPORTER


The chairman of the Joint Congressional Power Commission (JCPC) endorsed the Department of Energy’s efforts to address the worsening power supply shortage in Mindanao.


Sen. Serge Osmeña, chairman of the Senate Committee on Energy who also chairs the JCPC, said Energy Secretary Jose Almendras has been “trying to manage an unmanageable situation.”  


The JCPC is tasked with oversight responsibilities on the implementation of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001.


Osmena said, “The national reform policy on electricity, which was approved by Congress in 2001, was to harness the finances and management talents of the private sector in ensuring that the country would be supplied in a timely manner with dependable, quality and reasonably priced power.”


Osmeña said the state-run National Power Corp. (NPC) was bankrupt.


“Its assets, if sold, could not cover its liabilities,” he said. “And there was no way it could depend on Congress to support NPC through annual appropriations in the National Budget given the needs of other line agencies like the Departments of Education, Health, Public Works, Defense, Police, etc.”


He said, “Inopportunely, the residents of Mindanao, through their representatives, pushed for a 10-year exemption from the privatization program of the NPC-owned plants in Mindanao, notably the Agus-Pulangui hydropower complex which at that time supplied about 75 percent of the power needs of Mindanao at the lowest rate.”


Osmeña said, “Even worse, the bicameral committee agreed to postpone the construction of the transmission line interconnection between Leyte and Surigao.”


“But the energy demand studies made by the Department of Energy showed that Mindanao would run short of power in about 10 years.