The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has penalized the 600-megawatt Calaca coal-fired power facility of Sem-Calaca Power Corporation (SCPC) of the Consunji group due to excessive "forced outages" that it logged throughout its operations last year.

In a recently issued ruling, the ERC said it slapped SCPC with a total penalty of P4.312 million for both the units 1 and 2 of its Calaca coal plant in Batangas for breaching the unplanned outages cap set forth under Article V of ERC Resolution No. 10, series of 2020.

For unit 2, in particular, “SCPC is hereby directed to pay an administrative penalty in the amount of P3,975,600.00 within 10 days from the receipt (of the decision)...for having 96.2 days of unplanned outages in excess of the 16.8 days allowable unplanned outages,” the regulatory body has stipulated. The ERC decision was promulgated on January 28 this year.

On Calaca plant’s unit 1, SCPC was meted with a leaner fine of P337,200.00 because the excess forced outages had just been for 5.24 days, on top of the allowable 16.8 days.

According to the ERC, it had undertaken virtual inspection of Calaca plant’s unit 2 generating facility on June 18, 2021 “in view of recent events pertaining to the insufficient power supply in the grid, due to simultaneous or excessive outages of GenCos (generation companies).”

The regulatory body stated that when SCPC was quizzed on its generating facility shutdown which started way back in December 2020, the plant owner contended that “the unit 2 failure was totally unexpected with the addition of Covid-19 making it more difficult to repair the generator, thus, it (forced outages) should fall under force majeure.”

SCPC apprised the Commission that its unit 2 shutdown “was because of the generator stator ground fault followed by stator cooling water leak and tripping in the stator cooling water pump.”

Prior to its December 3, 2020 outage, SCPC emphasized that the unit 2 “underwent a life extension program wherein the GEC-Alstom generator was replaced by a new generator,” and that was supplied and installed by American firm subsidiary GE Philippines.

SCPC further narrated that “after nine (9) months of operations, the generator tripped; and the root cause of the generator fault was due to quality workmanship during the installation at site, resulting to the meltdown of one of the six-phase rings extension at the brazed joint inside the generator terminal box.”

And when SCPC pushed for the repair of its newly installed generator, it conveyed to the ERC that “the delay in the entry of GE technical foreign advisors who will perform the repair works on the unit had a big effect on the prolonged outages of the SCPC coal-fired plant unit 2.”

The Consunji-led firm likewise argued that “this outage event may not have extended if there are local experts to perform the repair works or contingency measures are in place to cater to failures of the newly installed equipment.”

But in the final evaluation, the ERC reckoned that the explanation provided by SCPC for its Calaca plant had been “without merit.”

The regulatory body primarily pointed out that despite the company’s claim of non-availability of local experts to do repair works on its equipment, “SCPC failed to submit evidence to show that contingency plans and measures were in place prior to the outage incident.”

The ERC similarly laid down that based on the outcome of its virtual inspection on the facility, it similarly uncovered that unit 2 of the Calaca plant “has not been operating as of September 5, 2021 which was past the initial mid-August 2021 projected resumption of operations.”

The regulatory body thus averred it is convinced that “SCPC has been remiss in its obligations which eventually led to units 1 and 2’s forced outage beyond the maximum allowable limit.”