Visayas grid on yellow alert due to coal, geothermal power trippings
National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) announced that the Visayas grid will be placed on yellow alert due to unavailable capacity from two coal plant units and unexpected tripping of a geothermal plant unit.
In an advisory on Wednesday, Nov. 19, NGCP said the Visayas grid is set to undergo a yellow alert from 3 to 8 p.m. This alert is placed when operating margin is not enough to meet the grid’s contingency requirement.
According to the grid operator, about 338-megawatts (MW) worth of coal capacity from Therma Visayas Inc. (TVI) units 1 and 2 are currently unavailable to the grid due to a disruption in coal-handling operations.
Additionally, there has been an emergency shutdown of Leyte geothermal power plant, as it has been derated from 79.5 MW to 39.3 MW.
Visayas currently has 2,694-MW worth of available capacity, while its peak demand is at 2,351 MW.
“Fourteen plants have been on forced outage between April to November, four since 2024, and two other power plants have been out since 2023; while 14 are running on derated capacities, for a total of 898.6MW unavailable to the grid,” NGCP further elaborated.
Meanwhile, the grid operator assured that the Luzon and Mindanao grids are under normal operations.
TVI is an Aboitiz-led coal facility, operating the 340-MW Toledo power plant in Cebu, while Leyte geothermal plant is one of the facilities under Lopez-led Energy Development Corp. (EDC). Both companies have yet to disclose further information about their repair activities.