‘Yellow alert’ amid ample power supply alarms DOE

By Lenie Lectura – June 5, 2020
from Business Mirror

The Luzon grid was placed on yellow alert for three hours on Thursday despite sufficient power supply.

According to the Department of Energy (DOE), the issuance of the yellow alert, from 12 noon to 3 p.m. was due to unplanned power plant outages and Malampaya’s natural gas supply restriction.

“While our power forecast indicates sufficient supply to meet rising demand due to the shift to the general community quarantine in the National Capital Region, the DOE considers both the recent forced outages, as well as the natural gas restrictions to be alarming,” it said.

As such, the agency called on the generation companies, the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines, and the natural gas fuel supplier to explain at the soonest why this happened.

“The energy industry must work together to ensure sufficient and stable power supply at all times. We also ask our industry players to approach us for any assistance the department could provide to fast-track the necessary restoration activities,” said Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi.

Should forced outages persist, the Energy foresees the potential occurrence of a Red Alert.

“We assure the public that we will exhaust all possible measures to help prevent power interruptions from occurring during this challenging period,” Cusi said.

Based on DOE data, the power plants that went on forced outage are SMC Masinloc Power Partners Coal Plant Units 2 and 3 (344 MW and 355 MW, respectively); Pagbilao Coal Plant Units 1 and 2 (382 MW each); SMC Limay coal plant (135 MW); San Buenaventura coal plant (455 MW); and Southeast Luzon Power Corp. (140 MW).

Also, a number of power plants did not produce their expected output.

In all, 5,000 MW was shaved off from the grid on Thursday. Of which, 2,858 MW came from unplanned outage, while derated power plants contributed 2,192MW.