There’s still no way out for many consumers on upturn in their electric bills, as the pass-on tariff of power utility giant Manila Electric Company (Meralco) will slightly go up by P0.0327 per kilowatt hour (kWh) in this August billing cycle.

Following that upward adjustment, the overall rate to be billed by Meralco to its residential subscribers will be P11.6339 per kWh versus P11.6012 per kWh a month ago – and that will redound to an aggregate bill increase of P7.00 for end-users in the 200kWh consumption bracket.

The utility firm previously hinted at a possible reduction in electricity rates this month, but in the end, it qualified that the increase had been generally traced to the P0.1086 per kWh hike in the ancillary services component of the transmission charges billed by system operator National Grid Corporation of the Philippines.

“For this month, ancillary service charges went up by more than 50 percent as charges for contingency and dispatchable reserves doubled,” Meralco stressed, in reference to the power supply being procured by NGCP to cover for its reserve requirements to sustain reliable flow of electricity to the load networks of end-users.

Meralco expounded “the transmission charge increase more than offset the P0.0503 per kWh reduction in the generation charge.”

On other line items in the electric bills, the power firm noted that the universal charge for missionary electrification declined by  P0.0433 per kWh, due to a true-up rate approval rendered by the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC); while taxes and other charges posted net increase of P0.0177 per kWh.

For the pass-on rate of its suppliers, its capacity sourcing from contracted independent power producers (IPPs), which accounted for 33 percent of last month’s supply, had logged charges that had been lower by P0.2974 per kWh, and that was generally attributed to “higher IPP dispatch, and peso appreciation that affected around 97 percent of IPP costs that were dollar-denominated.”

Meralco qualified that the slashed rates of the IPPs similarly “offset the increase in Malampaya natural gas price following its quarterly repricing.”

Conversely, the invoiced procurements from the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM), with 27 percent share in its supply portfolio, escalated by P0.5940 per kWh because of the pass-on of the third batch of installments on the deferred charges previously enforced by the ERC.

Had it not been for that deferred charges in the tariff pass-on, WESM charges for August billing should have been down due to tamed demand, which dwindled 690 megawatts in the last supply month; while the secondary price cap had been enforced at scaled down duration of just 2.3 percent in the July supply month compared to 6.6% in June.

The other factor which prompted rise in the overall generation charge had been the invoiced charges of the power supply agreements (PSAs), as that inched up by P0.0421 per kWh “mainly due to higher fuel-related costs.” The share of PSAs in its overall supply sourcing had been 40 percent last month.

Onward to the next billing, Meralco cautioned consumers that they shall brace for “possible increase in generation costs from First Gas - Sta. Rita and San Lorenzo, which use Malampaya gas.”

According to the power firm, the lapse of the old gas sale and purchase agreement (GSPA) in July had precipitated the use of a new pricing formula for Malampaya-extracted gas – although the proposed rates pass-on for this is still under the continuing scrutiny of the industry regulator.

Meralco Vice President and Head of Corporate Communications Joe R. Zaldarriaga emphasized that “once the new GSPAs are approved, this will certainly affect the generation charges of (the) Sta. Rita and San Lorenzo (plants).”