by Lenie Lectura - August 17, 2016
Power supply in Luzon will be
adversely affected when 12 power plants with total capacity of 4,004
megawatts (MW) will go offline for a specified period anytime this month up to
October this year.
The 12 generating units that will go
offline on scheduled maintenance are from six power plants: Ilijan, Santa Rita,
San Lorenzo gas plants; Sual and Southwest Luzon Power Generation Corp. (SLPGC)
coal plants; and Kalayaan.
The power-generating companies that
own and operate these plants have advised the National Grid Corp. of the
Philippines (NGCP) that they will implement maintenance work, which means these
units will be shut down on certain days. A scheduled plant-maintenance shutdown
is necessary to carry out unit inspections and maintenance activities.
Based on latest data provided by
industry stakeholders, the following units will go offline: Kalayaan 1 (180
MW), from August 14 to 18; Ilijan Block B (600 MW) on August 4 to September 4;
Santa Rita module 20 (250 MW), from July 23 to August 26; SLPGC (150 MW), from
July 12 to August 26; Ilijan (600 MW), from August 4 to 28; Santa Rita module
30 (250 MW), from August 27 to October 1; Sual 2 (600 MW), from August 22 to
September 27; San Lorenzo module 60 (250 MW), from October 1 to 8; Sual 1 (600
MW), from October 1 to December 1; and San Lorenzo module 50 (250 MW), from
October 3 to 10.
There is no threat of inadequate
power supply—at least in the areas being served by the Manila Electric Co.
(Meralco).
The utility firm distributes
electricity mainly in Metro Manila, Bulacan, Cavite and Rizal, as well as parts
of Batangas, Laguna, Quezon and Pampanga. Meralco has over 5 million
customers.
“It seems that we are already off the
hook. The forecast is good. It’s just that the maintenance schedule of some
plants that were originally set during the election period had to be moved to a
later schedule,” Meralco Spokesman Joe Zaldariaga said when asked if the latest
list of plant maintenance schedules will hamper the power supply in its
franchise area.
The Meralco official was referring
to the simultaneous shutdown of 20 power plants that were on maintenance, on
forced outage and others operated on limited capacity, for the period of July
26 to August 5. On those days, NGCP issued yellow- and red-alert status due to
insufficient power reserves.
Of the 20 plants, eight went on
forced outage, while 12 were on scheduled maintenance shutdown. This resulted
in the loss of more than 4,000 MW of capacity. Some of these plants were
originally scheduled to implement maintenance shutdown during election period,
but were requested by the Department of Energy (DOE), during the time of former
Energy Secretary Zenaida Y. Monsada, to move this after elections.
No to postponement
ENERGY Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi
said his office is no longer inclined to postpone maintenance schedules of the
power plants, as some of these facilities “cannot stretch anymore their
operating schedule.”
“The DOE does not like to postpone
any maintenance and we would like to follow strictly the schedule. And that is
what we are going to see forward—that they are followed,” the energy chief said
during a Senate committee hearing held on Tuesday.
Separately, in a text message, Cusi
said any alteration in the maintenance schedule could only worsen the power
supply situation.
“It’s in the past and I don’t like
to comment on it,” he replied, when asked if rescheduling the maintenance of
plants was a wrong move. “Postponing planned outage only complicates or
compounds the problem,” he said.
For Meralco’s part, company
President Oscar S. Reyes, in an interview, said the rescheduling of power-plant
maintenance was a “contributing factor” to the supply deficiency recently
experienced in the Luzon grid.
“No one wants a power interruption
to happen. Besides the scheduled shutdown of these plants there were also the
incidents of forced outage,” he said.
He believes that one of the reasons
some plants experienced unscheduled shutdowns is because these are either not
properly maintained or have moved their maintenance schedule to a later date.
“If you keep on moving the
maintenance schedule, then the risk of forced outage is going to be higher,”
Reyes said.
“The real key here is to have more
power plants and to facilitate the construction of new plants, as well as the
processing of permits, regulatory approvals, etc. That is the solution to all
of these,” he added.
For Aboitiz Power Corp., which
operates 45 generation facilities, it commended NGCP for “doing a great
job at scheduling when plants need to come on preventive maintenance.”
The generating companies submit to
NGCP the maintenance schedule of their plants so that the grid operator can
review this to make sure that supply will not be put at risk.
According to AboitizPower President
Antonio Moraza, the recent tightness in supply experienced in the Luzon grid
was also caused by unscheduled outages. “Machines can break down
unexpectedly. Recently, several at the same time,” he said.
He also noted that the scheduled
maintenance was “placed at this time of the year because demand was lower and
hydro plants can compensate.”
Recommendations
Cusi, during the hearing, presented
the agency’s short- and long-term measures meant to prevent the recurrence of
similar situations in the future.
One of the short-term solutions is
to facilitate the entry of new power plants.
Cusi cited the issuance of
certificate of compliance from the ERC to the 100-MW Avion gas plant, 450-MW
San Gabriel gas plant, and the 82-MW Anda coal plant—with a total of 632-MW
committed capacity. These plants are already ready for commercial operations.
The Energy Regulatory Commission,
Cusi added, must also resolve the dispute between Meralco and Millennium Energy
Inc. “This will add at least 90 MW to the Luzon grid,” Cusi said.
Other short-term measures include
the streamlining of the process for granting permits and endorsements to
generating companies; conduct of a technical audit; intensify the Interruptible
Load Program and encourage participation beyond Meralco franchise areas; and
review the reserve policy with NGCP and the distribution utilities.
For the proposed long-term
solutions, the DOE wants to revisit the protocols on planned maintenance
schedule and add more power-generating capacity via a proposed 200-MW new gas
plant that will be spearheaded by the Philippine National Oil Co.
The DOE also wants NGCP to fast
track the construction of new transmission-line projects, which include the
integration of the Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao grids, and remove line
congestions.
The chair of the Senate Energy
Committee, meanwhile, said the DOE needs to improve on a lot of things.
“There’s a lot of room for
improvement. For one, the DOE needs to improve its technical capability so that
it would no longer outsource experts to conduct an audit in the power sector,”
Sen. Sherwin T. Gatchalian said.
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