The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) placed the Luzon grid under yellow alert early afternoon Wednesday in the wake of forced outages and de-ratings resulting to the loss of 1,652.7 megaWatts of power.
The loss escalated from the tripping of the 417.4-MW San Gabriel natural gas-fired power plant that compelled the NGCP to declare the Luzon grid under yellow alert from 3 P.M. to 9 P.M.
According to the NGCP, the available capacity in the Luzon grid was only 13,198 MW against peak demand of 12,028 MW.
As this developed, the Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) placed the interruptible load program (ILP) participants on standby should the situation deteriorate, making necessary placing the Luzon grid under red alert status.
The ILP has stood by the NGCP the past ten years when customers with large electricity consumption run their own generator sets whenever electricity supply is short and paid for the trouble, of course.
The Department of Energy (DOE) said it is closely coordinating with NGCP and the generation companies to manage power demand.
The DOE also gave assurance that both the Visayas and Mindanao grids operate under normal conditions.
