Power cut hits Luzon anew over line tripping

Business World Online

Posted on July 02, 2013 11:22:27 PM

PARTS OF Luzon, particularly areas being serviced by Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), yesterday experienced a power interruption after a transmission line malfunctioned, with the main cause still being determined by officials.

“An emergency power interruption occurred in some parts of our franchise area around 6:34 p.m. Meralco implemented automatic load dropping because of insufficient supply,” Joe R. Zaldarriaga, Meralco spokesperson, said in a phone interview yesterday.

Parts of Bulacan, Caloocan City, Quezon City, Las Piñas City, and Manila were affected, he said.

“The longest interruption lasted nearly an hour, but as of 7:28 p.m., power was already fully restored,” Mr. Zaldarriaga said.

The Energy department, meanwhile, cited the tripping of Pagbilao-Tayabas lines 1 and 2 in Quezon province as cause of the incident.

“The brownout was caused by the line tripping of Pagbilao-Tayabas lines 1 and 2. Those are 230-kilovolt lines,” Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho L. Petilla said in a separate interview.

He said the line tripping affected three power plants that caused the loss of 1,400 megawatts (MW) from the Luzon grid, namely, the 460-megawatt (MW) Quezon, 1,000-MW Sta. Rita, and 750-MW Pagbilao power plants.

Meanwhile, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) in a statement yesterday evening confirmed line tripping.

“Cause is still undetermined at this time. NGCP is also monitoring the status of power plants that tripped and went offline causing about 1,000 MW of power load to be dropped from the grid,” the company said.

Yesterday’s event followed a power failure on May 8 in parts of Luzon, including Metro Manila and surrounding provinces, over a similar problem that led to the shutdown of six major power plants, raising fears of a possible blackout that would have derailed the May 13 elections.

The midterm polls were eventually held with uninterrupted power supply.

Based on NGCP’s, the May 8 incident resulted in the loss of 3,700 MW in the Luzon grid, almost half of the 8,300-MW peak demand for the island.

NGCP traced the problem to a unit of the 600-MW Calaca plant in Batangas that tripped along with the Calaca-Biñan 230-kilovolt transmission line.

The Energy department had said that a bush fire and failure of the transmission line’s auto protection system triggered the power plant shutdown. -- C. A. M. C. Feliciano  source