Led by City Mayor Naga locals air gripe on power plant move

CEBU, Philippines - Amid privatization talks for the power plants in the City of Naga, some of its residents and government officials, including Mayor Valdemar Chiong, marched yesterday morning to protest the planned rehabilitation of the 30-year-old coal-fired power facilities.

"We don't want to interfere with their conflict sa pag-privatize. Ang amo lang nga bisag kinsa makadaug sa privatization, dili mosugot ang Naga nga ayum-ayumon lang ang karaang planta," said Chiong.

Last month, Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corporation, which holds ownership of the 105-megawatt power plants in Barangay Colon bid out the property to private firms.

Thermal Power Visayas Inc., with its P1.088 billion offer, outbid Salcon Power Corp., which immediately exercised its "right to top" bid by paying P1.1.43 billion to PSALMC.

SPC is the current operator of the facilities.

Chiong, who led hundreds of protesters yesterday, said although the city will earn millions from taxes, the old plants give unfavorable environmental impacts.

"Efficiency-wise, dili na sab maayo. The older the plant, the more pollution among masinati sa Naga," the mayor added.

After three decades of operation, the two plants' generation capacity is down to 14MW and 30MW from 50MW and 55MW, respectively.

Placido Jandoc, SPC project manager, said they will get feedback on the results of the bidding by Friday.

But for his part, Jandoc said it is wise to purchase new plants for the sake of market "competitiveness."

"The plant is still running but deteriorating. It's better to have a new plant. It's more efficient and reliable that way," said Jandoc.

Jandoc said the two thermal plants, bought in the 1980s, underwent rehabilitation in 1994 and 1997 and although they could still be rehabilitated again, chances are they will become uncompetitive after three years once new modern power plants are running.

Jandoc said under their agreement with the National Power Corporation, which was the original owner of the property before it was handed to PSALMC, they are bound to produce a minimum 30MW per plant or else they will be shut down.

But since January 2013, one of the plants has not been performing well because of its deteriorating state. However, Jandoc said NPC has kept them in operation reportedly because the region has power supply.

He added that they already reported the problem to the government but since it has been planning to bid out the property, talks on rehabilitation became out of the question.

"The owner of the plant is the government. Anything naa'y major work, it's the responsibility of the government. As of now, pwede i-rehabilitate by the owner, but di man sila mogasto kay it's up to bidding man," Jandoc said.

Chiong said they are open to discussions and he is even willing to allow one of the two plants rehabilitated while the other replaced with a new one, granting that once the new replacement is operational, the old one should also be replaced. He said they are open to compromise as they also understand the needs of the power supply in the province.

Jandoc said 70MW of power is on standby for Cebu and if they shut down their 45-MW plant, there will only be 25MW.

Chiong said they have no control of the bidding process or what the winning bidder would do after but he threatened they will try to stop if the firm will only opt to rehabilitate the old plants.

He said they will be rallying outside the gates of SPC if it's what it will take to stop the plans. He also threatened not to endorse rehabilitation plans if any is submitted to his office.