Published July 10, 2017, 10:00 PM By Kier Edison C.
Belleza and Nestor L. Abrematea
Cebu City — A Visayas-wide power
shortage looms after last week’s strong earthquake damaged geothermal plants in
Leyte, an official of a power utility company in Cebu said Monday.
With the geothermal plants off the
grid, there is not enough electricity to supply the region, according to
Queenie Bronce, reputation enhancement manager of the Visayan Electric Company
(VECO).
Until the power situation
stabilizes, Bronce urged Cebuanos to conserve electricity.
“Now that we are having low power
supply, I encourage everyone in the VECO franchise area to save electricity by
switching off appliances that are not in use. In our own little way, we can
take part in addressing the power supply shortage,” she said.
Late last week, VECO, which serves
four cities and four towns in Metro Cebu, started implementing rotating
brownouts on the request of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines
(NGCP).
On Thursday night, right after the
magnitude 6.5 quake struck Leyte and was felt all over the Visasyas, VECO had
to sequentially switch off four to five feeders in different locations.
On Friday, a wider power
interruption gripped the VECO’s franchise area. On Saturday there was one
brownout in the morning and another in the evening.
There were no outages on Sunday, but
on Monday VECO resumed rationing in the cities of Mandaue and Cebu.
Bronce said the power interruptions
could last from five minutes to hours, depending on NGCP.
It will be up to NGCP to determine
when electric utilities like VECO can normalize its power distribution to
residential and commercial customers.
NGCP’s earthquake advisory Sunday
testing at its Ormoc Substation “has temporarily halted due to heavy rainfall
in the area, but will resume as soon as weather conditions become favorable.”
“Once testing is successful, Samar, Leyte,
Biliran, and Bohol will receive power from Cebu,” NGCP said.
In Tacloban City, businesses are
beginning to feel the fallout from the power outage.
Philippine Chamber of Commerce and
Industry-Leyte Chapter President Wilson S. Uy said the blackout “is hurting the
economy.” Uy,
Tacloban Filipino-Chinese Chamber of
Commerce and Industry President Jack Uy had the same sentiment, saying only
those who can afford to buy portable generators are able to keep their business
open.
Downtown Tacloban has been buzzing
with the sound of generators providing temporary power to their establishments.
Some banks have shut down their ATMs
because of the blackout.
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