ERC trims Meralco’s recovery
by Alena Mae S. Flores – March 06, 2017 at 08:20 pm
from Manila Standard Today
The Energy Regulatory Commission reduced Manila Electric Co.’s planned power rate adjustment as a result of the 20-day Malampaya maintenance shutdown.
ERC approved a fuel cost recovery of P0.66 per kilowatt-hour equivalent to P1.752 billion, lower than the P0.92 per kWh or P2.417-billion application of Meralco.
ERC said in a statement it approved the implementation of the fuel cost recovery in three installments, equivalent to P0.2211 per kilowatt-hour for March, April and May.
“We were able to calculate based on actual bill of suppliers…Meralco’s petition was based on projections or forecast,” ERC spokesman Floresinda Digal said.
Meralco previously wanted to recover P0.92 per kWh over a three month period, or P0.30 per kWh for March, P0.30 per kWh for April and P0.32 per kWh for May.
Digal, however, said the approved recovery, as applied by Meralco, did not include the computations on the impact of the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market and other suppliers of Meralco.
“When Meralco applied for the staggering, they used forecasted data or projections but when they were asked to submit the data late last week, there was a difference when we computed based on actual,” Digal said.
Digal said Meralco would have to include other costs such as prices from the WESM and other suppliers once it announced its March generation rate this week.
Meralco earlier sought ERC approval to stagger the implementation of its fuel costs as a result of the Shell Philippines Exploration- Malampaya Natural Gas Facility maintenance shutdown from Jan. 28 to Feb. 16.
The Malampaya shutdown affected the supply of natural gas to the power plants of South Premiere Power Corp.-Ilijan, Sta. Rita, San Lorenzo, San Gabriel and Avion natural gas plants.
The Malampaya gas field located in northwest Palawan fuels the said natural gas plants with an aggregate capacity of 3,211 megawatts to the Luzon grid, Of the total, 2,565 MW is supplied to Meralco’s franchise area.
ERC said the Malampaya shutdown coincided with the scheduled maintenance of the other power plants.
