ILOILO City – MORE Electric and Power Corp. (MORE Power) is ready to work with and for the city of Iloilo at reduced power rates for households and businesses.
MORE Power president Roel Castro stressed this as the company girds for a smooth transition of the power distribution system amid fears of power outage.
MORE Power’s legislative franchise was already approved by the bicameral committee of both houses of Congress to own, develop, operate, and maintain the electricity distribution system in this city.
The present power generation rate of Panay Electric Company (PECO) at P7.8299/kwh (as of mid-2018) has been decried by consumers as about P2.50/kwh higher than the power generation rates in Manila, Cebu or Davao.
In its bid to reduce the power rate, Castro said MORE Power will source majority of its power requirements from new bilateral supply contracts.
MORE will secure considerable capacity of the power requirements from the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) especially when market prices are low, said Castro.
To note, in 2017 WESM’s average selling price was P3.37/kwh.
MORE Power will also explore contracting supply from renewable energy sources which are value- added tax (VAT) free, said Castro.
MORE Power’s plan is to initially enter into a contract via a negotiated procurement of emergency power supply.
This plan is expressly allowed under a Department of Energy Circular and other existing guidelines, said Castro.
It is to be noted though that such emergency contracts shall only be for a period of one year, he said.
MORE Power is also ready to solicit offers from most power generators in the Visayas.
As to the systems loss, Castro said MORE Power vowed to reduce it from 11.20 percent to 5.5 percent.
The company is also bent on improving reliability from 31.15 times (SAIFI or System Average Interruption Frequency Index) and 1,612 minutes (SAIDI or System Average Interruption Duration Index) to Philippine standards (2.14 times and 54 minutes, respectively).
To realize this, said Castro, MORE Power will increase substation capacity to within 70 percent normal loading, correct unsafe electrical installations and correct voltage quality to within +/- 10 percent at 230 volts./PN
