Published
By Myrna M. Velasco
President Rodrigo
Duterte has directed the Department of Energy (DOE) to ensure that the power
plants operating in the country are strictly complying with operational
efficiency standards as well as on environmental laws and regulations.
He had given this
instruction to Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi during the recent inauguration
of the 500-megawatt San Buenaventura Power Co. Ltd. (SBPL) power plant project
at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Fort Bonifacio on Wednesday (October 16).
Duterte stipulated that he is directing relevant government agencies, primarily
the DOE, “to remain vigilant in monitoring the compliance of power generation
companies with existing laws and regulations.”
And while his
administration is embracing the transition for expanded installations of
renewable energy (RE) facilities in the country, the President is also calling
on investors – primarily power plant project sponsors and developers – to take
steps on deploying more advanced technologies even in coal-fired power
ventures, chiefly those that shall be spewing lower emissions.
“I asked you to follow
the lead of San Buenaventura Power by investing in the generation of clean
energy. The substantial reform that this administration had instituted in the
past three years – I can assure you that you’ll be able to pursue more
effective and efficient business strategies, as long as you give utmost
importance for the protection of our environment and the welfare of your host
communities,” Duterte stressed.
The ₱56.2-billion San
Buenaventura power project is the first to be equipped with supercritical
boiler technology among all coal-fired power facilities in the country. This is
a technology in the high efficiency, low emissions (HELE) genre which has up to
45% efficiency – compared to the more than 30% of the older technologies; and
also has the potential to bring down carbon dioxide emissions by up to 25%
more.
On the generation
efficiency front, the operating power plants in the country were being placed
under extreme public scrutiny because many of them often experience forced
outages, which in turn, places the electricity system into tight supply
conditions or even rolling brownouts especially in the last summer months.
Given these dilemmas,
both the DOE and the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) have been keeping a
close eye on them and have been enforcing measures so these unwanted forced
shutdowns of generating units could be minimized if not totally prevented.
ERC Chairperson Agnes
T. Devanadera opined that it is a bit confounding that both the old fleets of
generating facilities as well as the ones that just reached commercial
operations have been confronted with frequent unplanned shutdowns or on-and-off
generation.
Taking off from that
premise, the chair of the ERC indicated that they will be carrying out a study
to get to the bottom as to what operational or technical circumstances have
been triggering these plant outages.
“Somebody should come
up with study on the outages, because based on our data – from zero to five
years old, they already have unplanned outages which are very ironic,” the ERC
chief stressed.
Devanadera said the
Commission will likely tap a third party to carry out that targeted study – and
this will then be taken as a basis for the ERC to frame the allowable outage
allowances for power generating facilities.
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