Electricity demand ‘tame’ in 2 months
The manufacturing sector failed on its rebound momentum, hence, the country’s electricity demand had been ‘tame’ in the past two months, according to the operator of the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market.
Isidro E. Cacho Jr., chief corporate strategy and communications officer of the Independent Electricity Market Operator of the Philippines (IEMOP), noted that the rise in September power demand did not continue, instead there was demand drop of 500 megawatts (MW) in November this year.
“Our demand is still tame,” he said, noting that while it reached a high of 12,600MW in September, “that wasn’t sustained. The demand was tame latter part of October to early part of November.”
He explained that historically, September demand picks up because manufacturing companies ramp up on their production in preparation for the Christmas season.
But on this year’s sluggish power demand, there are array of circumstances being scrutinized by the spot market operator that could have trigged lethargic consumption in the commercial and industrial sectors – including frail consumer confidence, lower export performance due to the new series of lockdowns in the United States and Europe as they experienced second wave of Covid-19 infections; as well as the strong Philippine peso versus the US dollar which may have been contributing to weaker-than-anticipated performance of the manufacturing sector, primarily on the export segment.
On a month-on-month comparison, data from IEMOP showed that power demand for November this year had decelerated by 5.0-percent to 9,839MW from a more bullish level of 10,348MW a year ago.
For settlement prices in the spot market, IEMOP indicated this had fallen to P1.97 per kilowatt hour (kWh) in the October supply month from P3.48 per kWh in September; and even skidded further to P1.91 per kWh for November (reckoned up to November 22 trading results).
Engineer John Paul Grayda, pricing validation and analysis manager of IEMOP, said there were various factors driving down settlement prices this November, including the series of typhoons that barreled the country and the enforcements of intervention and suspension in the spot market.
That is on top of the reported demand decline in the last two months versus the acceleration that occurred in September.
The settlement price downtrend, he said, also happened despite the gas fuel restriction in the Malampaya field which had been scheduled for maintenance activities from November 14-27 this year. On the market intervention and suspension carried out for the spot market on November 12-13 at the height of typhoon Ulysses’ battering, Grayda stated that an administered price will be imposed for the affected trading intervals.