Electricity rates set to rise in April ¬— Meralco

posted April 06, 2016 at 11:50 pm by Alena Mae S. Flores
http://thestandard.com.ph/business/203053/electricity-rates-set-to-rise-in-april-meralco.html

Power rates will go up by P0.22 per kilowatt-hour this month, on higher generation charges and implementation of the feed-in tariff allowance, Manila Electric Co. said Wednesday.

“Main drivers for this increase in the rate are the higher generation charge and the imposition of an additional P0.08 per kWh on the feed-in tariff allowance,” Meralco said in a statement.

The power retailer said for a typical household consuming 200 kWh, this month’s adjustment would translate into an increase of P44 in their electricity bill.

Meralco said the higher demand due to the hot weather resulted in higher charges from the wholesale electricity spot market, the country’s trading floor of electricity .

“The increase in the rates was primarily due to the generation charge, which increased by P0.10 per kWh from last month. At P4.10 per kWh, it is P1.31 per kWh lower compared to April 2015’s P5.41 per kWh,” Meralco said.

The company attributed the increase in the generation charge to the higher charges from WESM, which went up by P2.23 per kWh.

Peak demand in the Luzon grid increased by more than 500 MW from the February to the March supply months, with the onset of the dry period.

Meralco said costs of energy sourced from power supply agreements and independent power producers registered slight reductions of P0.02 and P0.01 per kWh, respectively.

“These reductions in the PSA and IPP charges were mainly due to the higher dispatch of a number of plants under them, along with the appreciation of the peso in March,” Meralco said.

Meralco sourced bulk of its power requirements from PSAs accounting for 49.2 percent, followed by IPPS at 45.6 percent. Meralco sourced 5.1 percent of its power requirements from WESM in March.

Meralco also said FIT-All, a line item in the power bill of consumers, would start to reflect a charge of P0.12 per kWh beginning this month.

FIT-All is a component of the bill that is remitted to the National Transmission Corp., which in turn is paid to the renewable energy developers.

Transmission charge also registered an increase of P0.01 per kWh. Taxes and other charges increased by P0.03 per kWh following the increase in generation and transmission charges.

Meralco said its distribution, supply and metering charges remain unchanged after it registered a reduction last July.

Meralco said it was not earning from the pass-through charges, such as the generation and transmission charges. Payment for the generation charge goes to the power suppliers, while payment for the transmission charge goes to the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines.