Published
November 18, 2016, 10:00 PM By Myrna M. Velasco
The Department of
Energy (DOE) has concurred with the bid of the Energy Regulatory Commission
(ERC) on February, 2017 deadline extension of the mandatory phase of retail
competition and open access (RCOA), primarily for the 1.0-megawatt
contestability threshold.
This was indicated to
reporters by Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi, stressing that the energy
department needed to weigh the concerns of the affected segment of the
consumers, hence, they had to strike a compromise with ERC on an extended
timeframe. The original deadline was December this year.
Cusi qualified though
that mandatory contestability for the next threshold of 750 kilowatts (kW)
shall be maintained at the prescribed timeline of June, 2017.
ERC Chairman Jose
Vicente B. Salazar acknowledged that “the Secretary and I agreed on February
deadline during our meeting last week.”
On record, mandatory
RCOA will be the phase when contestable customers or the end-users can already
exercise their freedom of choice on supply procurement and can already contract
directly with their preferred retail electricity suppliers.
Salazar qualified that
“while our internal technical staff recommended a later date for mandatory
contestability, I insisted on the said date at Tuesday’s (November 15)
Commission meeting.” The ERC is a collegial body, hence, its Chairman has to
secure the approval of most of its members if not the entire Commission for any
relevant decision that they shall prescribe for the restructured electricity
sector.
The ERC chairman
reiterated “the Commission resolved to move the implementation of mandatory
migration for contestable customers with 1.0MW and up average peak demand, to
26 February, 2017.”
He further laid down
that “contestable customers which fail to finalize a retail supply contract
(RSC) with a retail electricity supplier (RES) shall have the option to be
served by the distribution utilities as a supplier of last resort.”
Salazar similarly
emphasized that in light of RCOA’s deadline’s extension, the Commission decided
“to review the SOLR (supplier of last resort) rules to make sure that the
applicable SOLR rate would not be burdensome on contestable customers.”
He further affirmed
that for the 750kW threshold, next year’s timeframe is already set for June
next year.
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