DAVAO CITY – The city’s electricity provider Davao Light and Power Corporation on Monday announced that power interruptions will continue with an estimate of one hour to a maximum of 1 and a half hours power off, despite the fact that Therma South Incorporated coal-fired plant went back online around 12:16 am today.
Ross Luga, Davao Light and Power Company (DLPC) corporate communications officer said they were expecting that with the coal plant’s return, brownouts would eventually cease.
“I was advised this morning that the scenario right now may have improved in view of the energization of the Therma South Incorporated. We are looking for a 1-hour power interruption. But as of now, we are still simulating and we will try our best to implement zero power interruptions,” Luga said in a press conference.
However, as of 9:30 am Monday the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) has imposed a 100 megawatt Mindanao-wide deficiency affecting all distribution utilities in the island including DLPC.
The deficiency is due to the emergency shutdown of one of the units of the Agus Hydropower Plant and the derated capacity of Agus and Pulangi hydropower plants.
From a 207 megawatt out of the 273 MW contracted supply, the power supply to DLPC has been reduced to 176 MW.
This deficiency translates to another round of rotating brownouts with a maximum duration of 1.5 hours in the DLPC franchise. This is significantly lesser than the 3-hour rotating brownouts implemented last week.
Luga also said the power interruptions is “beyond” their control.
As part of its contingency, Luga said Davao Light is operating the Bajada power plant which supplies 30 megawatts and the Hedcor in Sibulan and in Talomo. He said they are also optimizing on the sources of powers they have agreements with.
Luga said participating companies of the Davao Light, through its Interruptible Load Program or ILP, is also lowering the demand because of using their own generators.
“These companies, instead of drawing power from our distribution network, they would reload. They would use their own generators and thereby, reduce our demand for the entire franchise by 10 megawattas during the peak hours,” said Luga. (davaotoday.com)
