Meralco rates up for 2nd straight month, seen to continue in May

The Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) on Monday announced another upward adjustment in its electricity rate for April, marking the second straight month of increases.

According to Meralco, the overall rate for a typical household went up by 53.63 cents to P10.1830 per kilowatt-hour (/kWh) from P9.6467/kWh recorded in March.

Residential customers consuming 200 kWh can expect their total bill to increase by around P107 for the month.

Meralco attributed the upward movement to higher generation charges which increased by 39.87 cents to P5.8724/kWh from P5.4737/kWh in the previous month, due to upward movement in the charges from Independent Power Producers (IPP) and the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM).

Meralco head of Regulatory Management Office Atty. Jose Ronald Valles said the hike would have been bigger, if not for efforts to defer the collection of some P945 million in generation charges.

“This month’s generation charge increase would have been significantly higher, but Meralco coordinated with the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) and some of its supplier to again defer collection of portions of their generation costs to cushion the impact on the customers’ bills,” he said in an emailed statement.

The company said it was also ordered by the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to defer collection of P300 million generation costs, which reflected to lower generation rate by about 11 cents/kWh.

“On top of the deferred generation charges, the impact of the quarterly repricing of the Malampaya natural gas for the April supply will be reflected in the generation charge in May,” Valles said.

“Electricity consumption historically increases during the dry months, and this is expected to also weigh on the customers’ power bills,” he added.

Meralco earlier said customers can expect a higher monthly bill in May, to reflect the successive price hikes of petroleum pump prices on generation charges and the Malampaya repricing.

Domestic pump prices have been on an uptrend in 12 out of the past 14 weeks, which the Department of Energy (DOE) has repeatedly attributed to the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine that has hit global supplies and drove global prices higher.

Latest data available from the DOE indicate that year-to-date adjustments stand at a net increase of P16.00 per liter for gasoline, P26.00 per liter for diesel, and P24.10 per liter for kerosene as of April 5, 2022.

Meralco constructs, operates, and maintains electric distribution systems in the cities and municipalities of Bulacan, Cavite, Metro Manila, and Rizal, as well as certain areas in the provinces of Batangas, Laguna, Pampanga, and Quezon.

Shares in Meralco were down by P2.00 or 0.53% at P372.00 apiece as of 11:09 a.m. on Tuesday, April 11.—AOL, GMA News