Business World Online
Posted on October 12, 2014 10:49:00 PM
By Claire-Ann M. C. Feliciano, Senior Reporter and Melissa Luz T. Lopez
THE EXECUTIVE may have to settle for a watered-down arsenal of extra powers to deal with next year’s electricity shortage, as a leader of the House of Representatives said he expected to haggle with the Senate over authority Malacañang now seeks for this contingency.
The House Energy committee hopes to secure by the end of the month plenary approval of a proposed joint resolution containing various options the Executive can tap, while its Senate counterpart has opposed such flexibility, particularly in allowing government to contract additional generating capacities for summer 2015.
President Benigno S. C. Aquino III last September invoked the power crisis provision of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001, asking lawmakers to authorize various measures through a joint resolution. Oriental Mindoro Rep. Reynaldo V. Umali (2nd district) said yesterday that the House of Representatives will likely grant Mr. Aquino’s request.
At the same time, however, he admitted the House would still have to bargain with the Senate in coming up with a final version of the joint resolution. “We are in a position of bargaining,” Mr. Umali, who heads the House Committee on Energy, said in a telephone interview. “Ultimately, it will be a collective decision. It all depends on how the negotiation goes.”
Mr. Umali said it would be best to give the President “all the flexibility he needs,” rather than rely on the interruptible load program (ILP) alone -- the only measure his Senate counterpart has favored.
The House hopes to approve on third and final reading its version of the joint resolution by Oct. 29, the last session day before Congress takes a two-week break.
After both chambers will have come up with their separate versions of the resolution, these will be consolidated in a bicameral meeting for a final joint resolution that will then be submitted to Malacañang for enactment.
The Energy department estimates some 900 MW will be needed -- covering the deficit and required reserves -- to prevent potentially crippling outages between March and June next year.
House Speaker Feliciano R. Belmonte, Jr. said in a text message: “We hope the Senate as a whole, not just Senator [Sergio R.] Osmeña [III], will have a version closer to ours...We can’t risk having ILP only, which might not even require emergency.”
Mr. Osmeña, who heads the Senate’s Energy committee, has been pushing only for more effective use of the ILP, a scheme by which big consumers run their generating sets to ease demand in the grid in exchange for compensation. “What I will recommend is to pay for the extra power that those who own generating sets need in order to pay for their fuel,” he had said last month.
As of last week, Mr. Osmeña remained unconvinced of the need to contract additional capacities. “The committee feels we have sufficient reserves here in self-generating sets that private individuals or private corporations owned. We have as much as 3,163 megawatts (MW) in Luzon alone owned by companies that use it as back-up power,” he said on Thursday. “When you take into consideration that the peak demand in the Meralco (Manila Electric Co.) franchise area is 5,200-5,300 MW, it’s like you have a reserve of 60%.”
He also warned that contracting additional capacities would result in P0.10-0.15 per kilowatt-hour (/kWh) hike in power bills.
Malacañang yesterday said it would let legislation take its course. “Whatever individual legislators are saying now, the resolution will still go through plenary debate process,” Communications Secretary Herminio B. Coloma, Jr. said in a text message. source
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