San Lorenzo gas plant resumes operation

Manila Bulletin
by Myrna Velasco
July 22, 2014

The 500-megawatt San Lorenzo gas fired power plant of First Gas Power Corporation has been synchronized back to the grid on Monday, the operator firm has announced.

The Lopez company, in a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE), has noted that both units of the combined cycle gas power facility “have resumed operations.”

First Gen earlier apprised relevant stakeholders that its gas power facilities had been affected by flooding at last week’s onslaught of typhoon Glenda.

Many power plants have been out from the system last week – fundamentally Luzon and Visayas grids – either due to operational strain or damages induced by the typhoon’s strike.

This prompted distribution utilities like Manila Electric Company (Meralco) to schedule six-hour long of rotating brownouts up to Friday last week on deficient supply. That was even after most of its lines were already restored for electricity service to end-users.

The San Lorenzo plant has just gotten back to full operation in this year’s first quarter following months of “ceased generation capacity” for one of its generating units which was thumped by a fire incident at the facility.

The other plant of First Gen at the Batangas site – the 1,000-MW Santa Rita gas facility – had just undergone also an equipment replacement so it can shore up its volume of generation to optimized level.

Natural calamities or the so-called force majeure events are unwanted drawbacks in the operations of any country’s electricity system. Owners and operators of power facilities, however, are still required to guarantee the operations of their assets in the most efficient and reliable way.

Due to lower demand this week, the feared scenario of lingering rotating brownouts had so far been avoided – and that will be unless demand will suddenly pick up with anticipated rise in temperatures when the rains stop.

For most of the worst-hit areas of typhoon Glenda, however, dilemmas of blackouts may linger until next week. source