Visayas grid under yellow alert

MANILA, Philippines — The Visayas power grid was placed under yellow alert for two hours yesterday, the first for this year, according to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines.

The NGCP said that power reserves in the Visayas fell to low levels, affecting the grid from 5 to 7 p.m., following the unplanned shutdown of two major coal-powered plants.

The region’s peak demand stood at 2,284 megawatts, while its available capacity was only 2,403 MW.

At least 20 power plants across the Visayas have been on forced outages, adding to the strain caused by 21 others that were operating at reduced capacities.

This left around 681 MW of unavailable capacity to the grid, the NGCP said