Red flags up in 2024

While many Filipino families still have lighted up their homes with Christmas lanterns and ornaments after the holidays, many other people still live without stable source of electricity services, especially in far flung areas of the country. Much worse situated are the people living in the so-called GIDAs, or geographically isolated and disadvantaged areas.

Supposedly, the entire country is assured of more than enough power supply to meet our electricity needs based on the estimated demand situation. Surely, the El Niño phenomenon, or long dry period projected to linger on for the first half of this year would impact on the operations of our existing hydropower electric plants. This early, the Department of Energy (DOE) should prepare the country against prolonged power outages and blackouts that may result due to a lesser capacity coming from many of the hydro plants.

The crippling power outage that hit Panay Island last Tuesday could be the start of such unwanted power interruptions. The cause of which, according to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP), was due to the multiple power plants that tripped in Panay Island around 2:19 p.m. Panay Island was totally isolated from the rest of the Visayas grid after a total of 452 megawatts (MW) were lost to the grid, including the 150 MW on scheduled maintenance shutdown, the NGCP disclosed.

“Currently, none of the power plants in Panay Island are generating power,” NGCP announced in a brief press statement immediately after the power outage last Tuesday. Affected were residents in the triangle-shaped Panay island consisting of Aklan, Antique, Capiz and Iloilo, all in the Western Visayas region.

The NGCP, however, assuaged Panay folks they are working double time with power generators. After all, NGCP’s mandate is to ensure electricity transmission. The cause of the multiple power plant tripping has yet to be determined. The next day, both the DOE and the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) were breathing down the necks of the NGCP, not to mention the pressures from local officials of the affected areas, politicians, and some.

Consumers in the other franchised areas of some electric cooperatives are less lucky. In desperation, many of them have taken to social media and other platforms just to air their sentiments. They have been suffering unstable and unreliable electricity services since time immemorial.

Sifting through statistics, it is apparent that not even half of the more than a hundred of these electric cooperatives in the country are able to perform satisfactorily or according to standards.

In fact, even people living in areas just adjacent to Metro Manila such as several towns in Batangas with electricity distribution provided by an electric cooperative, Batelec II for instance, suffer the same poor services. Also recently, while we were in Vigan, Ilocos Sur last month, the beach resort we went to had to resort to using their generator sets following yet another unannounced power outage by a local electric coop.

Incidents of blackout occur often in many other areas of the Philippines – similarly situated where the power supply shortage have hounded residents, visitors and businesses alike.

It is, thus, high time for the government to assess the predicaments of people living under the mercy of poor-performing electric cooperatives. What is more compelling is to squarely address the challenges of ensuring stable electricity supply if the national government really wants no one to be left behind in the economic growth and development in the entire country.

No other interest must prevail except that which hoists the highest good.

Tracing the history of electric cooperatives in the country, it started way back in the Philippines during the watch of the namesake late father of President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr.  This was in a bid to electrify remote countryside, or places with only a few consumers that cannot be viably serviced by commercial distribution utilities. They were patterned after the United States system.

With rural electrification having been largely attained in the country albeit not 100 percent, some government officials and experts have noted these electric cooperatives have become obsolete. Since the remaining areas are still without electricity services, one cannot anyway be properly managed by the cooperative model.

It must be mentioned though that electric cooperatives also contributed their share in expanding rural electrification in the archipelago since they commenced operation decades ago. As to their suitability at present, however, much remains to be addressed and reconfigured. There are several factors at play.

First, the coverage areas of these electric cooperatives that are supposed to service rural areas for their members/consumers/owners are actually now in urban or suburban locations. Since these cooperatives are classified as such, they are able to avoid the regulations and standards that usually apply to normal corporations that carry out such mandate. With this kind of situation, some unique arrangements can also gain entry and work their way into the system of electric cooperatives.

Second, the regulatory framework under which these electric cooperatives operate  poses considerable challenges. Under the law, it is the National Electrification Administration (NEA) instead of the Cooperative Development Authority (CDA) that  oversees their business operations. On the other hand, it is the ERC that regulates their undertakings as distribution utilities.

It is therefore not surprising that such set-up has triggered confusion and overlap of functions. The CDA has been asserting all the while that all cooperatives must come under their jurisdiction and electric cooperatives should not be an exception.

The NEA’s primary mandate involves electrification and not the regulation of cooperatives’ management of business operations. While the NEA is mandated to handle based on long-standing regulation, the problems though ensued contributed in turn to the prevailing situation that weakened the performance of electric cooperatives in the country.

This is why some sectors have also posited the need to restructure the NEA in a bid to iron out these kinks. The bottom line in these discussions, arguments and clamors must be to ensure a reliable, secure, affordable and quality electricity distribution service for all our consumers.

This early in the first week of 2024, red flags are up on potential power outages as what took place in the Panay island grid.