Napocor to bid out contract for transfer of Pinamucan power plant

The National Power Corp. (Napocor) will bid out the contract for the transfer of the 110-megawatt (MW) Pinamucan power plant in the next two weeks, a ranking company official said.

Napocor president Rogelio Murga said they will have another pre-bid conference sometime early next month to allow the prospective bidders to have enough time to thresh out remaining issues on the contract.

Napocor was supposed to auction off the contract for Pinamucan last Friday but decided to postpone it for another two weeks because of some issues that have to be cleared out.

"Some of the bidders were asking more details of the contract," the Napocor chief said.

A Napocor source said the prospective bidders believed that the P535-million budget is insufficient to cover for the scope of the entire project.

But Murga pointed out that Napocor will just need to talk things out with these bidders. "We have to explain to them what their responsibilities will be covered in the contract and clarify their concerns," he said.

Murga said Napocor’s technical group is already readying for the new scheduled pre-bid conference.

He said they need not raise the contract price. "We do not have plans to increase the budget for the transfer," he added.

Despite this, Murga is optimistic they can still bid out the contract within the year. "We hope we can meet our previously set targets," he said. The transfer of Pinamucan is expected to take at least 10 months.

At least two big consortia have expressed interest to bid for the Pinamucan power plant from Batangas to Iloilo.

The transfer of the Pinamucan power facility is one of the measures identified by the government to help avert the possible power crisis in Visayas.

According to the bidding requirements issued by Napocor‚s Contracts Awards Committee (CAC), the project will involve the dismantling, hauling, transfer and installation of four 12.94-MW and four 14.63-MW diesel generator sets, auxiliary equipment and powerhouse from Pinamucan town to Dingle.

The winning bidder will also be required to supply various electro-mechanical materials and equipment needed for the safe and reliable operation of the plant after the transfer, and to undertake the construction of equipment foundations, power foundations, intrasite road networks and other plant facilities. Finally, the contractor will be responsible for the testing and commissioning of the power plant, which will be renamed the Dingle Diesel.