House stands firm on Noy’s emergency powers

MANILA, Philippines - The House of Representatives will not budge from its position on the proposed grant of emergency powers to President Aquino to enable him to deal with an expected electricity shortage in Luzon starting this month up to July.

“I have consulted with Speaker Feliciano Belmonte Jr. and other House leaders, and we were told to stand our ground,” Mindoro Oriental Rep. Reynaldo Umali, energy committee chairman, told a news conference yesterday.

“We are for no pass-on cost to the consumer and for limiting the exercise of emergency powers for five months starting this month up to July,” he said.

He said the Senate is for passing on the cost to consumers and lengthening Aquino’s exercise of emergency powers to July next year.

“Senators are also sticking to their position. So there is a deadlock in the bicameral conference on the joint resolution on emergency powers,” he added.

Isabela Rep. Rodolfo Albano III, the minority’s representative in the House contingent in the bicameral conference, said he supports the House stand for a no pass-on cost provision.

“Our people are already suffering from high power rates. Let the government absorb the small cost involved in this temporary solution to an expected electricity shortage this summer,” he said.

Umali estimated that the cost would amount to P100 million a month, or a total of P500 million for the five-month validity of the proposed special powers.

He said the amount would be paid to business establishments that would participate in the so-called interruptible load program (ILP), under which participating malls, factories, big offices and similar entities would be disconnected from the grid and required to use their own generator sets.

Asked why the Senate wants the cost to be shouldered by consumers, Umali quoted his counterpart Sen. Serge Osmeña III as saying senators “are for sticking to the policy in the law that the public should bear such expense.”

“They are saying that such policy should not be disturbed because disturbing it would not be good for investments,” he said.

Asked why Osmeña and his colleagues were more concerned with investments than helping consumers cope with higher power rates, Umali said, “I think you have to ask them.”

He said the bicameral conference committee has not agreed to meet again after its two meetings last week and on Monday.

“There is no agreement to meet again. If we cannot resolve our differences before we go on our Lenten break next weekend, this means that the resolution on emergency powers is dead,” he said.

It also means that the Department of Energy would implement ILP with consumers shouldering whatever cost involved in terms of higher electricity rates, he added.

Responding to a question, Umali said Aquino would accept any arrangement “so long as there will be no brownouts.”

Members of the bicameral conference committee from the Senate and the House met for the second time yesterday to come out with a reconciled version of the measure but ended up in a deadlock because of the pass through provision for the ILP.

Osmeña left the meeting at a little past noon yesterday and told reporters that the two sides could not agree on whether or not to pass on to consumers the cost involved in the ILP.

Osmeña noted that the two sides have agreed on practically all of the provisions in the joint resolution except for that pass-through provision.

The ILP involves having private firms, specifically big business and industries, supply their power requirements by running their generator sets at certain hours of the day during the critical summer months.

Since the participants of the ILP would not source their power from the distribution utilities and would run their generator sets, this would entail an additional cost on their part since they would need a significant amount of diesel fuel to run the generators.

Citing estimates from Meralco, Osmeña said that the amount that would be passed on to the consumers would be only four centavos per kilowatt hour (kWh).

For most households that consume an average of 100 kWh or less a month, the additional charge on their electricity bills because of the ILP would only be a maximum of P4.

Osmeña pointed out that Cebu and Davao power consumers have been exposed to the ILP for five years already and have absorbed the same four centavos per kWh additional charge in their electricity bills without any complaints.

“We cannot have the non-pass through provision because that is an exemption from the EPIRA (Electric Power Industry Reform Act),” Osmeña said.

If the no pass-through provision in the joint resolution is approved, Osmeña said that he expects the residents of Cebu and Davao to be in up in arms and call for a refund of what they have been charged for the ILP in the past five years. With Marvin Sy