Published
December 1, 2016, 10:01 PM By Myrna M. Velasco
The country’s power
distribution utilities (DUs) – giant players and the electric cooperatives
(ECs) alike – have been required to lay down investment strategies on how they
can further reduce their respective system losses so these can help bring down
the rates paid for by consumers.
In a hearing called by
the Senate committee on energy, the power utilities have been asked on the
scale of investments they have been making and how such correspond to system
loss reduction.
Senate Committee on
Energy Chairman Sherwin T. Gatchalian primarily asked the Energy Regulatory
Commission (ERC) to undertake a study on comparative system loss levels of
power utilities of various markets and benchmark it with how the Philippine DUs
have been performing on that sphere.
For Meralco that had
been continuously improving on its system loss reduction targets, the lawmaker
required it to submit new investment plans as well as its internal cost benefit
analysis.
Gatchalian similarly
required the utility firm to present data on its investment “versus how much
system loss that we can reduce and the impact to the consumers.”
Meralco noted that over
the years, it already forked out capital of R12 billion for installations of
some 7,800 elevated metering centers (EMCs) that then served as its investment
strategy to substantially pare its system losses to the level of 6.0 percent
and even lower on some billing months.
The next phase of
investment, it said, will be its proposed advanced distribution management
system (ADMS) that will primarily require it to roll out more modern and
data-driven metering infrastructure – that shall also be a vital component of
the company’s multi-year smart grid journey.
Meralco noted “every
time we procure an equipment to form part of our system, it is always part of
our criteria to look at efficiency and its effect on technical losses.”
The utility firm
assured “we buy high quality power transformers because of technical loss
component, and the same for our distribution transformers… we also continuously
replace aging and dilapidated secondary wires.”
Many other private
distribution utilities are on parallel investment trajectories when it comes to
targeted system loss reductions.
But for the ECs,
capital injection approaches are seen more diverse.
System losses for ECs
are still at higher levels of 10 to 13 percent on average, with some even
loftier depending on the geographical characteristics of their service areas as
well as the density and profile of customers and end-users.
According to the
Philippine Rural Electric Cooperatives Association Inc. (Philreca), “one
contributory factor is the configuration of the system,” citing that “in a
certain province, it depends on how the populace is located… variation that
goes along with DUs is not identical.”
The EC group
similarly noted that very often” their “physical infrastructures are different
and that big contribution (to system loss) would be equipment and materials
used.”
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