Cebu faces serious power shortage in coming months

CEBU — The production of the Cebu-Negros-Panay (CNP) grid recently fell by 77 megawatts, giving Cebu a serious power shortage in the coming months due to repairs of power generators.

Moses Red, corporate staff specialist of the National Power Corp. (Napocor), told The Freeman that most of the grids’ five power generators have gone off-line for repairs.

Aside from this, the Panay-based Power Barge 102, which generates 24 megawatts, will be transferred to Mindanao by May, leaving the CNP grid without at least 101 MW.

Power shortage in May and June will be alarming if no additional power supply will be integrated into the system.

"For this month, we are not yet that critical but mind you the demand is increasing and yet the supply continues to dwindle. We will just hope that no big power plants will have an emergency shutdown anytime, otherwise as early as now, we will have a power shortage," Red said.

The 35-MW Palinpinon plant in Negros was shut down last March 16. It is expected to be back in operation on April 20.

Besides, Salcon Corp.’s 50-MW Power Plant I is now running at only 42 MW due to some difficulties. It was supposed to undergo repair last March but this was deferred due to the Palinpinon plant’s ongoing repair.

The Panay Diesel Plant I and II, with a combined capacity of 10 MW, have been also out of commission since March 11. They are expected to be operational by June.

Panay’s Power Barge 104, with a total capacity of 24 MW, was totally shut down last April 11 as it is due for a two-month dry-docking.

Once repaired, the Power Barge 104 will possibly no longer be brought back to Panay as it will be brought to power crisis-hit Mindanao.

Red, however, said Napocor is expecting that Panay’s 100-MW Pinamukan plant, which is undergoing test and commissioning, will be on-line by June.

He added that even if this power generator will be integrated into the CNP grid, it will still be a break-even, meaning no power surplus is expected.

Red said Napocor just has to inform power distributors, including the Visayan Electric Co. Inc., should a need for brownout rotation arises.

As of Friday, the CNP grid had a total capacity of 745 MW against the power demand of 701 MW. — Freeman News Service