The Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) will conduct a competitive selection process (CSP) to procure 70 megawatts (MW) of power supply it needs from January 2022 to January 2037.
In a published bid invite, the utility firm said the power supply should be sourced from baseload power plants or those that continuously run on a 24/7 basis.
The third-party bids and awards committee has set the deadline for the submission of interest on October 15. It is poised to declare a failed bid if less than two expressions of interest are submitted.
A pre-bid conference is scheduled on October 22 while the bid submission deadline is set on November 19. The bids will be opened and evaluated on the same day.
The bid invite states that an annual ancillary service cost recovery cap, with a floor value of P0.28 per kilowatt hour, will be considered in computing the Levelized Cost of Electricity. The bidders’ proposed price and LCOE are subject to a pre-determined reserve price, which will only be revealed by the committee to qualified bidders during the opening of bids.
Meralco utility economics head Lawrence Fernandez said the conduct of the competitive bidding for the 70MW power supply requirement is in compliance with the 2019 Supreme Court (SC) ruling, which required all power supply agreements (PSAs) submitted with the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) after June 30, 2015 to undergo a CSP.
Meralco’s PSA with Panay Energy Development Corp. (PEDC) was among the many PSAs affected by the SC decision in the petition filed by Alyansa Para sa Bagong Pilipinas (ABP). In its May 2019 decision, the SC ruled that the ERC gravely abused its discretion when it unilaterally postponed the implementation of the CSP—a requirement under a 2015 Department of Energy (DOE) circular—twice, from June 30, 2015 to November 7, 2015 and again to April 30, 2016.
Some 90 PSAs were submitted to the ERC for approval from June 30, 2015 to April 29, 2016.
ABP said these PSAs include seven midnight coal contracts worth $10 billion which Meralco allegedly entered into without the benefit of bidding on April 26, 2016, just before the extended deadline. The seven contracts were between Meralco and Central Luzon Premier Power Corp., St. Raphael Power Generation Corp., Mariveles Power Generation Corp., Global Luzon Energy Development Corp., PEDC, Atimonan One Energy Inc., and Redondo Peninsula Energy Inc.
