August 27, 2019 | 12:31 am
THE DEPARTMENT of
Energy (DoE) is set to issue a circular that will phase out the collection of
charges from electricity consumers to subsidize missionary electrification, an
official said.
DoE Undersecretary
Felix William B. Fuentebella said the proposal has met opposition from entities
that benefit from the subsidy, called the universal charge for missionary
electrification (UCME).
“Kausapin muna natin
‘yung tamang mga entities sa (Let’s talk first to the relevant
entities in a) public consultation and focus group discussions,” he said in an
interview last week.
He said the circular
still lacks details on computation and what entities can still benefit from the
UCME, which is managed by the National Power Corp. (Napocor) as the agency
tasked to provide electricity to areas that are not connected to the country’s
power transmission network such as islands.
The UCME is collected
from all on-grid electricity end users under Republic Act No. 9136 or the
Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2011, or EPIRA.
Napocor had applied for
provisional approval to collect this year up to P17.805 billion from power
users, through an increase to P0.1948 per kilowatt-hour in their electricity
bills. Missionary electrification is funded from revenue from power sales in
off-grid areas and from the UCME.
The phaseout of the
UCME was raised by the DoE last week in a Senate hearing on microgrids during
which representatives of electricity cooperatives expressed their wish to avail
of the subsidy to fund the establishment of networks that are independent from
the main grid.
“We just wanted to
clarify that non-[Napocor] entities hindi na sila pwedeng kumuha ng
(cannot avail of the) UCME after we already passed the circular for omnibus
missionary electrification,” Mr. Fuentebella said.
He said the DoE does
not want consumers to continue subsidizing missionary electrification as well
as power charges of off-grid islands.
He said the impending
circular should identify those that should not be receiving UCME.
“Pag malaki ka nang
negosyante bakit ka nakikinabang sa UCME o sa subsidy na
binabayaran ng isang ordinaryong mamayan na consumer dito (If you’re
a big business why are you benefiting from the UCME or the subsidy being paid
by ordinary consumers),” he explained. — Victor V. Saulon
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