Rotational blackouts hit Mindanao

DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Daily power outages of up to six hours have been hitting Davao City and the nearby areas in the past few weeks. 

The prevailing power situation also reportedly affected other parts of Mindanao, wherein power outages lasted up to eight to 10 hours. 

Davao Light and Power Co. (DLPC) announced that the power supply situation in its franchise areas remains unstable. 

DLPC said on Dec. 3, the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) declared a deficiency of 80 megawatts (MW) for the Mindanao-grid, due to the reduced capacity of Agus and Pulangi Hydropower plants. 

The 150-MW coal-fired power plant of the Therma South Inc., which underwent emergency shutdown, remained offline as of Dec. 4.

The situation has resulted in two to three hours of rotating power interruptions daily in areas covered by the DLPC franchise.

However, the power outages here continued until yesterday, even when the NGCP posted a 261-megawatt reserve for Mindanao.

With the current power supply delivered as of Dec. 4, the DLPC said it would not be able to cope with the demands of its consumers in all of its franchise areas.

It estimated a deficiency of about 50 MW on the average.