By ERWIN ‘AMBO’ DELILAN
CALL IT a power(ful) providence for the people of Cebu, Negros and Panay Islands.
It’s the Cebu-Negros-Panay 230-kilo Volt (KV) Backbone Project Stage 3 courtesy of the Sy-led National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP).
Blessed and inaugurated on April 8 by no less than President Bongbong Marcos Jr., this power transmission highway promises formidable accessibility, reliability and sustainability in boosting the power industry in the whole Visayas.
But with such a gigantic promise, the question is, what’s next?
ABUNDANT POWER SUPPLY
Well, the transmission highway is already there. No just an ordinary one, but superb.
But how can this power infrastructure be useful to everyone?
The answer: We need more power generators. We need abundant power supply to pass through this transmission highway.
It’s too technical to dwell and describe things about power generation and transmission. But in lay man’s understanding, we can always liken the story to a simple road.
Before, the road is rough. Many evade or skip to pass by. They do not want to have their vehicles to be destroyed.
Then, there’s a group, or let’s say the government, that endeavored to make such road into a highway.
Many are happy. Many take the road now, which was less travelled before.
‘POWER WISH’
In the case of NGCP’s Cebu-Negros-Panay 230-kilo Volt (KV) Backbone Project Stage 3, it is called a super power transmission highway meant for all the power outputs in the Visayas – be it fossil-powered or renewable energy (RE).
Question: Do we have plenty of power to make use this power facility by NGCP?
On Negros Island alone, Sir Frank Carbon of the Metro Bacolod Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MBCCI) says we need at least 350 to 400 megawatts of additional base load power to move on amid unabated on-island developments leading to a robust economy in the newly created Negros Island Region (NIR).
This “power deficit” in the very near future lingers on the mind of energy stakeholders as to when this “power wish” will be addressed.
The role of the Department of Energy (DOE) to approve power generation projects is crucial. It needs to entice more investors to put up more power plants in Visayas by easing the application standards and permitting requirements.
If DOE will remain “passive” on this particular role, “nothing good will happen”.
Maybe, we will go back to a “blaming game”.
LEFT IN THE DARK
Nergros will continue to import power from Panay and Cebu. This is not good anymore.
What Sir Frank is trying to advocate is – build, build, build more power plants not just in Negros but in the entire Visayas.
If power plants in Cebu and Panay will simultaneously conk, Negros will be left “sneezing”. Worse, Negrenses will be left in the dark.
Futuristic thinking is not a sin. It helps those employing macro imagination. And in the power sector, innovation is always welcome. But sometimes it is being “killed” through an “induced abortion” by means of corruption within some government agencies supposedly tasked to propel the industry.
VITAL GAME
Talking of power, technically speaking all the intricacies are innate within the subject matter per se.
What is simple to say is that NCGP did its best to please the President who wishes tto have a stable, reliable, affordable, and sustainable power in the countryside to inject progress and development.
The Cebu-Negros-Panay 239 kV is the “best offering” indeed.
Question: Who’s next to play a vital game to avoid the feared dysfunction of this power transmission highway?
Will the DOE bite the bullet to entice more investors in the power industry?/PN
