Power supply is expected to remain stable during the dry months with peak demand likely reaching only 12,611 megawatts in June, the same level as last year’s peak, according to officials of the Independent Electricity Market Operator of the Philippines.
“Based on availability of supply and our big supply margin because system demand has not taken off, we can say that supply is stable even during summer,” IEMOP chief operating officer Robinson Descanzo said.
Descanzo said this could change because some power plants might go on forced outages during the dry months which could affect supply.
“Historically if temperatures go up, some plants bog down. So let’s hope there is no simultaneous shutdown, and still there is enough supply and we can avoid brownouts,” he said.
Based on IEMOP projections, supply will reach around 15,267 MW in June, enough to address the anticipated maximum demand of 12,611 MW.
“For the demand, we just follow or adapt to the actual demand during GCQ. In consideration of La Nina, we assume that demand is projected to reach peak during the pandemic period. The peak demand during quarantine was 12,611 MW which happened last June 2020,” John Paul Grayda, IEMOP manager for pricing validation and analysis, said.
Power demand is seen to steadily increasing starting March to 11,426 MW, 11,821 MW in April and 12,261 MW in May.
Grayda said prices at the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market were projected to remain at around P2 per kilowatt-hour level in the summer months.
IEMOP operates WESM, the country’s trading floor of electricity.
“For the upcoming summer months, we see the resulting price at P2, so of course it will depend on the supply demand condition. Here, we mentioned that in terms of supply, we follow the grid operating plan of NGCP, so we see some dip in supply particularly during mid of April as well as early May,” he said.
Grayda said if additional 1,000 MW of power plants would go on forced outage, WESM prices could be affected, with prices going up to P3 to P6 per kWh.