The Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has set at 6,367,759 megawatts the maximum installed capacity a generation company (GenCo) can own and could dispatch nationwide to ensure market competition. The limit is based on the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA), which provides the market share limits (MSL) for power generation firms to prevent dominance of just a single or few players in the industry. On a per grid basis, the regulatory body similarly mandated that the installed capacity a GenCo can own in the Luzon grid shall be 5,336.590MW; then Visayas will be 1,039.326MW; and Mindanao at 1,265.395MW. Section 45 (a) of the power industry reform law laid down that no company or related group can own, operate or control installed generating capacity (IGC) that shall exceed 30-percent per grid; and 25-percent for the national grid. As established by the ERC, the current installed capacity of the country already hovers at 25,471.037MW. Of this capacity, the Luzon grid accounts for 17,788.635MW; Visayas at 3,464.420MW; and Mindanao at 4,217.982MW. The industry regulator emphasized that in determining the IGC, it employed the Pmax or the maximum load as referenced on the technical specification of a generation facility. The regulatory body qualified that these figures were reckoned on the certificate of compliance (CoC) that had been issued to the power company; which also corresponds with its capacity that had been registered with the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market. The ERC indicated that it similarly factored in capacities owned and controlled by power firms in the retail electricity supplier (RES) segment; as well as those on energy storage (as converted to megawatt-equivalent from megawatt-hours) because these are also defined as ‘generation’ under prevailing rules. ERC Chairperson Monalisa C. Dimalanta explained that the installed generation capacity “serves as our baseline in determining the existence of a breach in the market share limit of any market participant.” The IGC is updated annually to reflect the capacity additions being integrated into the power system, primarily with new plants getting on commercial stream. “The ERC is mindful of its role in promoting market competition, encouraging market development, and in discouraging/penalizing abuse of market power and any anti-competitive behavior in order to ensure a level playing field   particularly in the generation sector,” Dimalanta said. Since the deregulation and restructuring of the electricity sector more than 20 years ago, no power industry player violating market share limits had been flagged so far.