Brownout hits several Metro Manila areas

Published July 2, 2013 7:11pm

(Updated 8:06 p.m.) A tripping of the Pagbilao-Tayabas lines 1 and 2 in Quezon province may have caused the power outages that hit parts of Metro Manila Tuesday evening, the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) said.

In a media advisory, NGCP said the Pagbilao-Tayabas lines 1 and 2 tripped at 6:34 p.m. and affected parts of Manila Electric Co.'s franchise area.

"[The] cause is still undetermined at this time. NGCP is also monitoring the status of power plants that tripped and went offline causing 1,000 megawatts of power load to be dropped from the grid," it added.

For now, NGCP is focusing on restoration of the affected power lines

Among the areas affected by the power outage were San Juan and Valenzuela cities.

Meralco issued a similar advisory on its Twitter account. Another post said the "emergency power interruption" was due to "an automatic load dropping (ALD)."

"All efforts will be exerted to restore power as soon as possible," Meralco added.

Atty. Cynthia Alabanza, spokesperson for the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, said an ALD only means that some of the consumers may lose their electricity due to a power disturbance.

"Kapag load dropping, ibig sabihin may nangangailangan ng kuryente pero hindi nabibigyan ng kuryente," she said in an interview aired at "24 Oras."

Alabanza added that some power plants with an equivalent of a thousand megawatts became offlline at around 6:30 p.m.

"May mga plantang nag-offline. At dahil 'dun mayroon tayong nawalang power equivalent to around one thousand megawatts," she said.

She said a line connected to the grid was affected, but was fixed in time for the power to resume at around 6:55 p.m.

Investigation is still underway for the cause of the shut-down, Alabanza said.

A report on GMA News' "24 Oras" said the power interruption was not widespread. — KBK/VC, GMA News

Tags: metromanila, brownout, meralco