Power failure hits Metro Manila, nearby provinces as 6 power plants shut down

UPDATE 11 – 10:47 p.m.) A power failure hit Metro Manila and a wide swathe of Luzon today as six power plants shut down, according to government and the country’s privately-run transmission monopoly.

Brownouts hit Metro Manila, Laguna, Cavite, Batangas, as far south as Bicol and as far north as Ilocos around 2 p.m. today.

Energy Secretary Carlos Jericho Petilla said a power line of the National Grid Corp of the Philippines (NGCP) tripped first, setting off a domino effect that first shut down the 600-megawatt coal-fired Sual plant and then five other plants, which have a combined output of 3,700 megwatts.

TeaM Energy Corp operates the Sual plant, but the output and fuel supply is owned by San Miguel Corp (SMC).

TeaM Energy said external factors, not any internal technical problem, caused the Sual plant to trip. “The drop in grid frequency caused by the trip of other plants resulted in an automatic trip of Sual Unit 1. This is a protective system meant to prevent major damage to our facility,” the company advisory said.

“We are currently trying to start up the plant. Barring any complications, it should be ready to provide electricity in one to two hours,” TeaM Energy added.

The other power plants that shut down were the Sta. Rita and San Lorenzo natural gas plants — both owned and operated by Lopez-led First Gen Corp — the Quezon Power coal plant of Thailand’s EGCO, the Ilijan natural gas plant operated by Korean Electric Power Corp (Kepco) with output and supply owned by SMC, and the Calaca coal-fired plant operated by Semirara Mining Corp.

Petilla said there “is no reason to think this is sabotage,” adding, “This is one of those things that happens at these particular times.”

Department of Energy (DOE) director Mylene Capongcol said, “The last time a power outage of this scale hit Luzon was in early 2000.”

The DOE is looking at NGCP’s transmission lines as the possible cause since “the likelihood of five major plants bogging down is extremely unlikely,” Petilla said.

In a statement, NGCP however blamed the blackout on “a generation deficiency due to the unplanned outage of five power plants supplying electricity to the Luzon grid.” Later, the grid operator said six plants were shut down.

NGCP said the six power plants had an unscheduled shutdown at 2 p.m. The outage lasted about four hours.

“NGCP assures the public that its transmission lines are secure and fully functional. It will dispatch available capacities once the power plants are restored and online,” the grid operator said.

LRT 1 and 2 services disrupted

The Light Railway Transit Authority went on Code Red due to the power failure. At 2:45 p.m., LRT Line 2, which runs from Recto to Santolan had resumed operations, but Line 1, which runs from Baclaran to Roosevelt in Quezon City, remained at a standstill.

Operations of the Metro Rail Transit Line 3, which runs from Edsa-Taft to North Avenue, were not affected.

According to Manuel V. Pangilinan, chairman of Manila Electric Co (Meralco), the transmission line had tripped. The country’s biggest power distributor services the Greater Manila area.

Joe Zaldarriaga, Meralco spokesperson confirmed the distributor was suffering from supply deficiency. “We are still assessing,” he added, when asked the volume of electricity supply cut off from Meralco’s distribution network.

Petilla said the power failure had downed about 50 percent of Meralco’s franchise. Meralco’s load is about 7,000 MW, while Luzon’s demand is about 8,200 MW at peak. “So we lost around half of the supply,” Petilla said.

Although the power failure affected utilities throughout Luzon, “the bulk of the areas are in Meralco’s franchise,” he said.

Although there are “must-run” plants that can provide power in case of a major problem, he said the largest of these was only 1,200 MW and not enough to restore full power.

During such situations, “the grid prioritizes supply to vital institutions,” Petilla said, adding that Malacanang should be the last one to suffer from power failure, but it did. “Pero binalik agad power sa kanila (But power was immediately restored to them),” he said.

Petilla dispelled concerns a similar power failure could affect the May 13 elections. Since this was a transmission problem and not a generating plant trouble, power can be restored in a matter of hours instead of months, he said.

“By the end of the day, we should have power back,” he added.

NGCP said this would depend on how soon the six plants could restore power. As of 9:46 p.m., power had been restored across Meralco’s franchise area, the utility said. –Euan Paulo C. Añonuevo, InterAksyon.com, with reports from Ben Arnold O. de Vera, Likha Cuevas-Miel, and Abigail Kwok, Interaksyon.com