Zambo City blackouts down to 5 hours daily

By Mindanews on March 6 2014 5:28 pm 
ZAMBOANGA CITY (MindaNews/06 March) – Rotational daily blackouts in the city that lasted eight to nine hours have been reduced to five hours starting Wednesday, an official of the Zamboanga City Electric Cooperative (Zamcelco) said Thursday. 
Omar Sahi, president of Zamcelco, said they shortened the blackouts after the Iligan City-based Mapalad Power Corporation (Mapalad) provided additional 15 megawatts (MW) to the cooperative.
Sahi said this happened after they have successfully completed all the requirements including the letter of credit. 
He said Mapalad is now providing a total of 18MW to Zamcelco. But he said Zamcelso still suffers from a power deficiency of around 20MW. 
The peak load demand of the cooperative is 88MW. He said aside from Mapalad, Zamcelco gets its power supply from the Power Sector and Liabilities Management (PSALM) and Therma Marine Incorporated, which allot 37MW and 18MW, respectively. 
Meanwhile, Sahi said they have requested the ERC to issue them a provisional authority to enable Zamcelco to purchase 7MW from the Bukidnon-based Crystal Sugar Company. 
Sahi said the rotational blackouts per feeder will be further reduced to two hours daily once the ERC issues the provisional authority. Zamcelco has 24 feeders with over 100,000 consumers. (MindaNews) source