Palm Concepcion Power Corp., owner of the 270-megawatt coal-fired power plant in Iloilo province, will deliver 135 MW or half of its output to the Visayas grid by late next month.
Palm Concepcion said in a statement the plant would start supplying electricity to customers in Panay, Negros and the rest of Visayas once it synchronized its operations with National Grid Corp. of the Philippines.
The company said the Concepcion-Barotac 138 kV transmission line, including the new Concepcion 138kV GIS Substation and the expansion of Barotac Viejo Substation constructed by Palm Concepcion, were now energized.
“The immediate completion of the associated transmission facilities can be attributed to the hard work of the whole Transmission Line team of PCPC and the dedicated effort and full support that NGCP extended to us,” Palm Concepcion president and chief executive Roel Castro said.
Castro said another factor that contributed to the fast completion of the transmission lines was the early settlement of the transmission line’s right-of-way.
“We made sure that all those affected by the construction of the transmission facilities were compensated accordingly and that all documentary requirements are in place for the proper turn-over of these transmission assets to NGCP,” he said.
The company is scheduled to have its reliability tests run in the next couple of months. The first 135-MW unit of Palm Concepcion will be in full commercial operations once the test runs are completed.
“The schedule of the commercial operations is just right on track as what we have committed to our customers,” senior vice president for project development group Winifredo Pangilinan said.
Ten distribution utilities and electric cooperatives have signed supply contracts with Palm Concepcion for their baseload power requirements.
Palm Concepcion held the groundbreaking ceremony on the first phase in January 15, 2013.
NLSC, the consortium of First Northeast Electric Power Engineering Corp. of China, Liaoning Electric Power Survey & Design Institute and Shenyang Electric Power Design Institute Co., Ltd. was tapped as the project’s general engineering, procurement and construction contractor.
Alstom Power of Europe, one of the world’s foremost suppliers of steam turbines and power generation equipment, provided the steam turbine and generator for the project, while SNC-Lavalin was the project construction manager.
Palm Concepcion is a joint venture of Palm Thermal Consolidated Holdings Corp. and Jin Navitas Resource Inc.
Palm Thermal is a subsidiary of A Brown Company Inc., a listed company engaged in real estate, agribusiness and which has ventured into the utilities and energy industry in recent years.