NGCP: Luzon Grid under Yellow Alert status, to be raised to Red Alert within Tuesday

The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) placed the Luzon Grid under Yellow Alert status on Tuesday morning, which will be heightened to Red Alert before noon and again in the evening.

In an advisory, the NGCP said the Luzon Grid will be placed under Yellow Alert from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m., from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., and from 10 p.m. to 12 a.m.

A yellow alert indicates that the grid has thin reserves, based on the supply and demand.

The Luzon Grid will also be placed under Red Alert from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m., indicating that there is zero ancillary services or a generation deficiency exists.

Available capacity is at 11,408 megawatts while the peak demand is estimated at 11,593 megawatts.

In a separate advisory, the Department of Energy (DOE) said the yellow and red alerts resulted from the unplanned outage of GMEC Coal-Fired Power Plant Unit 2, which took place at 3:56 a.m. due to a suspected boiler tube leak.

The plant, with a capacity of 316 megawatts (MW), is expected to be back online by June 8, 2021.

Apart from the unplanned outage of GMEC Coal-Fired Power Unit 2, GMEC Coal Fired Power Plant Unit 1 and Sem-Calaca Power Corp. Calaca Unit 2 Coal-Fired Power Plant are on forced outage since February 6, 2021 and December 3, 2020, respectively. The three plants on forced outage have a total capacity of 1,579 MW.

Three hydroelectric power plant units of San Roque Power Corp., meanwhile, are on planned outage since May 30. The plants have a total capacity of 435 MW.

In order to maintain a balanced system, the NGCP may implement manual load dropping (MLD) or rotational brownout in parts of Luzon Tuesday to “maintain the integrity of the power system.” 

The NGCP is a privately-owned corporation in charge of operating, maintaining, and developing the country's state-owned power grid.

The State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC) holds a 40% stake in NGCP, while Henry Sy Jr.’s Monte Oro Grid Resources Corp. and Robert Coyiuto Jr.’s Calaca High Power Corp. each hold 30%.

The NGCP consortium holds a 25-year concession contract and a 50-year franchise to operate the country’s power transmission network. —KBK/RSJ, GMA News