Malaya plant auction set on Sept. 18
By Alena Mae S. Flores – September 15, 2019 at 07:30 pm
from manilastandard.net
State-run Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. is set to bid out the 650-megawatt Malaya thermal power plant in Pililla, Rizal on Sept. 18
“So far, yes the bidding is set for Sept. 18,” PSALM president Irene Garcia said over the weekend.
Garcia said the agency would choose the winner from four pre-qualified bidders, including DMCI Power Corp., D.M. Wenceslao and Associations Inc. FGEN Reliable Energy Holdings Inc. and AC Energy Inc.
PSALM earlier tapped a consultancy firm for the plant valuation and its underlying land in Rizal province. PwC Philippines scored highest among the three competing consultancy firms during the negotiated procurement, anchored on a quality-based evaluation procedure that PSALM conducted in March.
The Malaya plant consists of a 300-MW unit with a once-through type boiler and a 350-MW unit fitted with a conventional boiler. It serves as a “must-run” unit which means it is designated to run when supply is tight in the Luzon grid.
PSALM was supposed to bid out the facility in March 2017 but it was put on hold after the Energy Department decided to include in the bidding the option to convert the plant into a facility running on liquefied natural gas. The plan did not push through.
Meanwhile, the Energy Regulatory Commission directed PSALM to submit evidence to support its claims for the recovery of the universal charge for stranded contract costs and stranded debts amounting to P6.12 billion.
The ERC set the hearings on PSALM’s petition for the availment of National Power Corp.’s SCC portion of the universal charge equivalent to P0.0620 per kilowatt-hour for 2018 in October.
PSALM, tasked to manage the assets and liabilities of Napocor under the Electric Power Industry Reform Act of 2001, sought to recover the UC-SCC over a one-year period from approval.
Stranded contract costs of Napocor refer to the “excess of the contracted cost of electricity under eligible contracts over the actual selling price of the contracted energy output of such contracts in the market.”
“The issuance of the provisional authority for this petition would enable PSALM to immediately recover SCC and use the UC-SCC proceeds to service maturing loans and IPP (independent power producer) obligations of eligible IPP contracts,”
PSALM said in its application.PSALM said the approval of its petition would also reduce the financing requirements of the agency to service its maturing obligations, thus lessening additional borrowing costs.
