As the government cannot provide viable ‘quick fixes’ to the country’s shaky power supply situation, Luzon grid will have to increase its dependency on the interruptible load program (ILP) which is underpinned by the switch-on of generating sets (gensets) of big-ticket customers that are mostly feeding on carbon-emitting diesel fuel.

Power utility giant Manila Electric Company (Meralco) and the Department of Energy (DOE) have intensified anew their call for more companies “to join the government’s interruptible load program (ILP) to help ensure power supply sufficiency throughout the dry season.”

That band-aid solution, however, is not helping the country on its decarbonization goals as the red alert condition in the grid last week already warranted more than 500 megawatts of ILP-anchored gensets being switched on – and that negates part of the major efforts of many other investors to opt for renewable energy (RE) solutions.

As emphasized by the industry players, the very desperate choice left for consumers at this point will be either to embrace the ‘polluting solutions’ or bear the brunt of rotational brownouts – and the other scenario that consumers cannot avoid will be spikes in electricity rates.

In the past, the easy alibi on the incidents of red and yellow alerts had been pinned on the lack of reserves procurement by system operator National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP), but even after the contracting of ancillary services and operationalization of the reserve market as well as the completion of key transmission projects, the industry is still stuck in that dreaded power supply mess.

During the red alert conditions in the Luzon grid last week, Meralco noted that “the support of ILP participants has proven to be highly critical in avoiding rotating power interruptions in the Meralco franchise area .”

The utility firm narrated that the ILP solution was being enforced recurrently since 2014 – and since then, this was activated 27 times within the utility firm’s franchise area.

Following last weeks’ declaration of red alert and yellow alerts in Luzon, Meralco highlighted that at least 1.9 million customers had been spared from electricity service interruptions.

Meralco Vice President and Head of Utility Economics Lawrence S. Fernandez qualified that the ILP mimics ‘bayanihan’ or cooperation “as we all try to do our part to mitigate the impact of El Niño on the power sector.”

Additionally, Ma. Cecilia M. Domingo, vice president and head for Enterprise and National Government at Meralco stated that the ILP participants “greatly helped relieve pressure from the power grid, sparing thousands of small businesses and households from rotating power interruptions.”

With the continuing fragility of the power supply situation, DOE Director Irma Exconde similarly pleaded for the “support and cooperation for the country’s objective of having continuous power supply by participating in the ILP and being part of the solution to the power supply challenges.”

The threatening electricity supply crisis in the country was already a major concern even prior to the time that the Marcos administration took over, but solutions have been coming ‘too little and too late’, hence, ILP is the only ‘remedy’ that the industry can lean on when power supply traverses breaking points.

The ILP is a demand-side solution that targets the voluntary de-loading or reduction of grid supply draw of big-ticket customers – primarily industries and commercial establishments; and they must instead use their own generating sets so that supply pressure from the grid could be eased.

For several times this year, the DOE has projected that power supply will be sufficient -- and the economic center of Luzon, in particular, will not reach critical levels of red alert. But similar to past forecasting scenarios, this year has been another ‘epic fail’ for the energy department.