NGCP seeks P662-million expansion

Business Mirror

Published on Wednesday, 03 July 2013 20:16

Written by Paul Anthony A. Isla

THE National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP), the country’s sole power lines concessionaire, said on Wednesday that it is seeking the approval of the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) for the installation of another transformer in its Las Piñas substation.

The NGCP said the Las Piñas substation is one of the six substations that supply the power requirements of Metro Manila through the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco).

The NGCP said the Las Piñas substation expansion project is estimated to cost P662.7 million and is expected to be completed in 33 months after the approval of the ERC is secured.

The substation, NGCP added, has three 300-megavolt-ampere (MVA) power transformers as installed capacity.

It plans to add another 300-MVA transformer to increase the substation’s capacity and meet the increasing demand of Meralco customers.

Rico C. Vega, NGCP deputy assistant chief technical officer for planning and engineering, said they will have to resort to load shedding if the Las Piñas substation suffers overloading.

“We can avoid this scenario since the substation will be more capable of handling larger load by carrying this project,” Vega said.

He added that they are pushing for the implementation of the project to address the N-1 contingency requirement of the Philippine Grid Code. He explained that the N-1, or single outage contingency, allows the transmission system to function normally even if a transformer has stopped operating.

In Las Piñas substation’s case, Vega said, if one of the three transformers malfunctions, it would result in overloading for the remaining transformers that would gravely affect the power supply of Metro Manila.  

The NGCP is a privately owned corporation in charge of operating, maintaining, and developing the country’s power grid. It transmits high-voltage electricity through “power superhighways” that include the interconnected system of transmission lines, towers, substations and related assets.

NGCP’s regular maintenance activities, expansion, and upgrading projects aim to enhance the reliability and quality of electricity delivered to grid-connected customers like generators, distributors, and large industries.   source