DOE eyes penalties for power firms over plant outages amid Visayas grid alerts

The Department of Energy (DOE) is looking into possible penalties for power generation firms whose plants have been offline for extended periods, contributing to repeated yellow and red alerts in the Visayas grid since mid-May.

At the sidelines of a forum hosted by the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP) on Wednesday, Energy Secretary Sharon Garin said penalties have yet to be finalized as an official order still needs to be issued.

“Right now, they don’t have penalties yet because I have to issue the order… currently, we are evaluating because when you shut down a power plant, there are consequences so before we penalize, like cancel their license, we have to make sure that we have replacement power also,” she said.

Garin added that the DOE is conducting an assessment of plants that have been on forced outage for more than six months, as well as those that repeatedly go on forced outage every year.

“I'm asking my team to do it within the first half of the year… Give me an assessment of plants that are on forced outages for more than six months already or those plants that every year they are on forced outage,” she said.

The Visayas power grid has been hit by repeated red and yellow alerts for nearly a month, driven by high electricity demand during the hot dry season, along with unplanned plant outages and reduced generating capacity from several facilities.

On Wednesday, the island group was placed under red alert from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m., followed by a yellow alert from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

“Visayas is problematic. We're quite transparent about this. Now and next year, if we do not do anything, Visayas will still have these red, yellow alerts,” Garin said.

“That’s why we had a meeting with the President last week. He said to find the immediate solution and the long-term solution,” she added.

Among the immediate measures being considered is the deployment of power barges to augment supply in the Visayas grid.

“We’re scouting around Visayas and we're looking for power plants within Visayas to augment the supply… We're looking for about 150 to 200 megawatts additional,” Garin said.—MCG, GMA News