The Department of Energy said yesterday that if the forced outages in power plants will persist, the canvassing of votes following the May 13 elections could be marred with probable one-hour rotating brownouts.
However, the DoE is hopeful that “miracles” could happen within that 60-minute span.
That has been the “worst case scenario” painted by Energy Assistant Secretary Redentor E. Delola when asked about the power-supply demand setting during the election period.
“The worst case scenario, like what happened on April 10, 11, and 12…if we expect that there would still be outages and the demand is higher, then we will have a problem,” the Energy official stressed, with him emphasizing that the power interruptions could be “one hour per area.”
On the actual voting day on May 13, the DoE is confident of sufficient power supply because that day was declared a holiday, and so many offices and businesses will be closed, hence, the demand trajectory for electricity will be down.
However, on the tallying of votes on May 14, Delola noted that if the scale of forced outages will reach the level as they are today at maximum 1,500 megawatts being taken out from the system, he qualified that the situation could turn “problematic” and rotating brownouts may not be avoided.
On the projected one-hour power interruption per area, House Committee on Energy Chairman Lord Allan Velasco indicated that the “integrity of the election results will raise questions if brownouts happen” which could be perilous especially because the administration bets are leading, hence, he urged the DoE for concrete solutions.
While Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi was assuring the Joint Congressional Power Commission during the Thursday hearing that power supply will be sufficient during the election period, another power plant in Luzon grid tripped – the 382-megawatt Pagbilao 1 coal-fired power facility of the Aboitiz Group. (Myrna Velasco)
