First Gen clears $118M

MANILA, Philippines - First Gen Corp., the listed power generation company of the Lopez Group, reported a net income of $118.2 million in the nine months to September, down from $150.1 million a year ago.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange First Gen attributed the 21.3-percent drop in income to reduced sales from ancillary services and the accident at subsidiary FGP Corp.’s San Lorenzo natural gas-fired power plant.

“The reduction mainly resulted from the lower income booked by First Gen Hydro Power Corp. (FG Hydro) due to reduced sales from ancillary services and FGP Corp. as a result of the fire at the main transformer of San Lorenzo’s Unit 60, which has a nameplate capacity of 250 MW. (FGP is the owner of the 2x250-MW San Lorenzo natural gas-fired power plant.),” First Gen said.

The fire happened in May but the company has already bought a replacement transformer and expects to re-commission the facility in December.

First Gen said lower interest expense of $17.2 million helped offset the decline in income. This was result of the prepayment and refinancing of its loans.

“On a recurring basis, net income attributable to parent was $134.5 million, lower by 4.7 percent than the same period last year due to the lower recurring income contribution of FG Hydro and FGP,” First Gen said.

In terms of revenues, First Gen also reported that consolidated revenues decreased by $153.8 million, or 9.8 percent to $1.419 billion in the first nine months of 2013 from $1.573 billion in 2012.

In its disclosure, First Gen reported that the Santa Rita and San Lorenzo natural gas-fired power plants accounted for $943.2 million, or 66.5 percent of the total consolidated revenues while Energy Development Corp’s geothermal revenues (ex-FG Hydro) accounted for $429.4 million or 30.3 percent, and FG Hydro accounted for $43.7 million or 3.1 percent.

The First Gas plants’ revenues were 12 percent lower from the previous period’s $1.071 billion due to the lower dispatch of the gas plants and lower average gas prices, First Gen also said.

The company attributed the decrease in dispatch to a scheduled major maintenance outage at the 1,000-MW Santa Rita power plant and the fire that occurred at San Lorenzo’s Unit 60 transformer last May.