NGCP seeks cost recovery for typhoon-damaged facilities

MANILA, Philippines – The National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) is seeking to recover over a five-year period nearly P55 million incurred from the repair and rehabilitation of facilities damaged by two typhoons in December 2014.

The grid operator filed an application with the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) for a provisional approval for the collection of the force majeure pass-through costs from its customers in Visayas and Mindanao.

Its transmission assets were severely damaged during the onslaught of Typhoon Ruby on Dec. 6, 2014 and Tropical Storm Seniang on Dec. 28 the same year.

Immediately after the devastation of the typhoons, NGCP said it started the repair, restoration and rehabilitation of affected assets to prevent power outages.

The grid operator said it spent P37.81 million for the repair, restoration and rehabilitation of damaged transmission assets and other related facilities.

Meanwhile, the recoverable value of the assets destroyed is equivalent to P16.56 million.

In its application with the ERC, NGCP proposed to recover costs starting January 2016 to December 2020.

For Visayas, it proposed an additional pass-through cost of P0.76 kilowatt per month in 2016, P0.59/kw-month in 2017, P0.22/kw-month in 2018, P0.21/kw-month in 2019 and P0.20/kw-month in 2020.

Meanwhile, Mindanao customers will be charged an additional P0.30/kw-month in 2016, P0.08/kw-month in 2017, P0.07/kw-month in 2018 and 2019, andP0.06/kw-month in 2020.

Under the Rules for Setting Transmission Wheeling Rates (RTWR), NGCP is allowed to recover the cost it incurred in the repair, restoration, and rehabilitation of its transmission assets and other related facilities damaged by the force majeure events (FME) through an FM Pass-Through Amount.

An FME is defined as a “typhoon, storm, tropical depression, flood, drought, volcanic eruption, earthquake, tidal wave or landslide.”