NGCP updates 10-year transmission plan

By Riza T. Olchondra
Philippine Daily Inquirer
12:04 am | Tuesday, April 15th, 2014

National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP), which runs the country’s power transmission superhighway, has crafted a new plan for putting up new transmission backbones and upgrading existing systems under its Transmission Development Plan (TDP).
The TDP outlines the ongoing and future transmission projects in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao for the period 2014 to 2023. For this, NGCP consulted stakeholders such as DOE, National Transmission Corp., Grid Management Committee, Philippine Electricity Market Corp., generation companies, distribution utilities, and concerned organizations through a series of public consultations.
Three public consultations were held in Davao, Cebu and Alabang on March 26, 28 and April 1, respectively.
Spokesperson Cynthia D. Perez-Alabanza said in a phone interview that NGCP recently went on a road show to present the TDP to stakeholders nationwide.
“The TDP is composed of committed projects and also indicative projects for which there is no budget yet but for which stakeholders have expressed an interest. The TDP is updated yearly and we need to present it to energy stakeholders so that they can give inputs on the plan before its submission to the DOE for approval,” she said.
The transmission projects in the pipeline will address the entry of new generation plants, projected load growth, transmission congestion, system reliability and power quality, and will interconnect major islands.
Apart from putting up new transmission backbones, NGCP also intends to rehabilitate and repair existing transmission lines and substation equipment, and upgrade their system.
The TDP, which is a 10-year plan updated annually, will then be integrated to DOE’s Power Development Plan and Philippine Energy Plan to create a comprehensive program for the country’s energy requirements. The first TDP released was put out in 2009. source