INDEED, power to the people and that is cheap, reliable electric power courtesy of MORE Power.
Who would have thought that it all started with Pavia Sangguniang Bayan Member Dan Fajardo’s concern for his constituents burdened by the high cost of electricity charged by their electric cooperative hovering around P11 to P12 per kWh as compared to MORE Power charging Iloilo City consumers P6.48 per kWh?
To put that concern into action, SB Dan Fajardo gave a privilege speech asking the possibility of MORE Power’s franchise to include nearby municipalities.
Fajardo’s privilege speech prompted the town’s Sangguniang Bayan (SB) to unanimously pass a resolution echoing his call, which in turn also prompted their congressman to file a bill to that effect.
And that started the ball rolling. The inevitable happened sooner than later. Excerpts from the May 31, 2022 issue of Panay News:
The Senate on Monday approved on third and final reading the MORE Electric and Power Corporation (MORE Power) expansion bill or House Bill (HB) 10306.
Once signed by President Rodrigo Duterte, the new measure will allow Iloilo City’s sole power distributor to expand its service coverage to the second and fourth districts of Iloilo province.
Amending Republic Act No. 11212 or the legislative franchise granted to MORE Power, HB 10306 got a total of 17 affirmative votes and one negative vote. It is now a step closer to finally becoming a law.
The President is expected to sign the measure before his terms ends on June 30.
Excerpts from House Bill 10306;
Nature and Scope of Franchise. – Subject to the provisions of the Constitution and applicable laws, rules and regulations, there is hereby granted to MORE Electric and Power Corporation, hereunder referred to as the Grantee, its successors or assignees, a franchise to establish, operate, and maintain, for commercial purposes and in the public interest, a distribution system for the conveyance of electric power to end users in the Cities of Iloilo and Passi and the Municipalities of Alimodian, Leganes, Leon, New Lucena, Pavia, San Miguel, Santa Barbara, Zarraga, Anilao, Banate, Barotac Nuevo, Dingle, Duenas, Dumangas and San Enrique, in the Province of Iloilo.
When HB 10306 becomes law and implemented, it is a testament that MORE Power is the standard on how power distribution utilities should operate and that is putting excellent service and the welfare of the consumers first before profit.
Take note that a steady flow of profit is a natural consequence of keeping the customer satisfied.
And speaking of keeping the customer satisfied, we segue to this very significant development, excerpts from the May 30, 2022 issue of Panay News:
MORE Electric and Power Corporation (MORE Power) is bringing in an additional P1.1-billion investment to further improve its services in this southern city.
This has brought MORE Power’s total investments to P3 billion, according to Engineer Bailey Del Castillo, the firm’s deputy head of network operations.
This will be used to do rehabilitation works such as replacement of old poles and transformers, rehabilitation of substations and construction of the Banuyao switching station, construction of new substations, installation of protection systems, automatic circuit reclosers, and Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems.
MORE Power has also uprated its power transformer at the City Proper substation while there is an ongoing construction of a new Megaworld substation.
Del Castillo said for the next three years or up to 2025, the approved additional capex will be utilized for continuing rehabilitation and upgrading of the five existing substations.
“Eventually after the 2025, there will be nine substations including the three new — 36 MVA mobile substations. The new 36 MVA mobile substation is set to arrive in July this year and this will signal the immediate start of the rehabilitation of the five substations.
Del Castillo said the new additional substations are expected to result to an improved voltage regulation while the system is expected to become robust with the loop distribution system.
Complementing the system is the installation to the network of 34 automatic circuit reclosers and the load break switches. With these devices, power restoration can be done immediately when there are outages.
Moreover, Del Castillo also noted that they have started the installation of tree wire conductor, the very first in Iloilo.
This wire is a bigger and upgraded one and wrapped with a layer of track-resistant covering unlike the existing bare wire. With these covered wires, outages due to birds, gecko, tangled kites and especially the vegetation can now be avoided.
“We are excited on this tree wire installation project. This is one of the highlights of our investments,” said Del Castillo.
These and other ongoing projects and programs of MORE Power are expected to be completed in the next three years.
This is the commitment of MORE Power to “I Am Iloilo City”. Just imagine what it will do to improve power distribution services once the expanded franchise is put to effect.
People, we’re in good hands for the next 25 years and hopefully MORE./PN
