DOE sees 4 more yellow alerts in Luzon

MANILA, Philippines — The Luzon grid is still not completely out of the woods yet in terms of possible power interruptions despite cooler days in the remaining months of the year.

Energy Undersecretary Rowena Guevara said there are still four potential yellow alerts that could occur in Luzon this year.

Guevara cited the El Niño phenomenon as the primary reason for these possible yellow alerts, which the Department of Energy (DOE) is monitoring.

She said one of the hydropower plants had recorded a 70 percent drop in capacity.

“We do not see any potential yellow alerts in Mindanao since the demand there is only two-thirds. For the Visayas, there might be a possibility during evenings since there is no solar (power),” Guevara said.

A yellow alert is issued when the power operating margin is insufficient to meet the transmission grid’s regulating and contingency requirement, but does not necessarily lead to outages.

A red alert is issued when the power supply is insufficient to meet consumer demand and the transmission grid’s regulating requirement, which can lead to rotating power interruptions.

In July, the DOE gave assurance that the country had sufficient power supply even as a severe dry spell loomed with the onset of El Niño.

The DOE said this does not discount transmission and distribution problems that might occur or unexpected problems with the generation plants.

On Oct. 1, the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines monitored a disturbance at 6:45 p.m., which affected the San Jose-Nagsaag 500-kilovolt transmission line 2 and multiple power plants in Luzon as well as resulted in automatic load dropping (ALD).

The disturbance also affected some customers of the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), who experienced power interruptions lasting up to several hours due to the ALD.

Around 850,000 Meralco customers in parts of Metro Manila as well as Batangas, Bulacan, Cavite, Laguna, Pampanga, Quezon and Rizal were affected by the ALD.