Power rates in Baguio, Benguet dip in July due to lower generation cost

BAGUIO CITY —  Power consumers in Baguio City and Benguet province will enjoy lower electricity rates this July.

Benguet Electric Cooperative (Beneco) consumers will enjoy the discount for paying its bill to its power supplier, Limay Power Incorporated (LPI), ahead of the due date.

For the July billing cycle, Beneco member consumer owners (MCOs) who will consume 100 kilowatt hour (kWh) will pay P88.00 less in generation charge.

This means that the total rate for July will be P10.3333 per kwh which is lower compared to the P11.3951 per kwh in June for residential consumers.

According to Beneco, the bill will be reduced by P1.0618 per kwh.

Under its power supply contract with LPI, Beneco will enjoy a prompt payment discount (PPD) if it pays its previous bill 15 days ahead of time.  

“One reason for the reduction (in rate) is due to the application of the PPD that Beneco got from the LPI as incentive,” Fraiser Angayen, Non-Network Services Department (NNSD) manager, said.

LPI bills Beneco an average of P300 million monthly. The amount represents the generation charge component of the power bill that consumers pay every month and which Beneco remits to its power supplier.

The reduction of the total rate can be attributed to the lower generation rate this month which is P5.8421 per kwh compared to P P6.8246 per kwh last month.

The generation system eats up the bulk, from 60 to 65%, of all the items to be paid in unbundled bill.

Angayen said that another factor that helped in the reduction of the generation charge is the order of the Energy Regulation Commission (ERC) that the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) component of the generation charge will be collected in four installments.

Under ERC Order No. 2024-17 MC issued on June 13, 2024, all distribution utilities (DUs) will implement a staggered collection over a period of four months their WESM purchases from April 26 to May 25, 2024.

Beneco will not collect one time the cost of the power it bought from WESM for the period mentioned but will bill the same until October.

However, due to the volatility of price of coal in the world market, foreign exchange rate and the volatility of prices at the WESM, Angayen cautioned MCOs to expect unstable generation rates that may cause a spike their bills in the coming months.

It could also go down, he said.  

Aside from residential consumers, the reduction will also be felt across all types of consumers - commercial (low and high voltage), industrial (low and high voltage), public buildings (low and high voltage) and streetlights