MONDAY BLACKOUT: Unexplained power outage hits Panay, Guimaras

By Francis Allan L. Angelo

The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) has yet to fully explain the “system disturbance” that caused the hours-long blackout in Panay and Guimaras islands on Monday, Feb 20, 2023.

Based on its 11:24 a.m. advisory, NGCP said it “monitored a system disturbance which affected the entire Panay sub-grid.. “

“NGCP is investigating the root cause of the incident and currently expediting power restoration efforts for affected areas.”

NGCP operates the transmission lines that bring electricity from power plants to distribution utilities and electric cooperatives.

By 2:24 p.m., NGCP said it successfully “restored power transmission services to all affected customers in Panay Island, after the system disturbance monitored at 11:24 AM of the same day.”

“NGCP is awaiting the synchronization of affected power plants back to the grid. Rotating power interruptions may be experienced by customers as supply is currently being sourced from renewable plants.”

NGCP noted that Aklan Electric Cooperative’s franchise area experienced “issues unrelated to the system disturbance.”

Daily Guardian tried to get a more specific explanation on the outage but NGCP only referred to the same advisory on the system disturbance that affected Panay.

The outage heavily affected Iloilo City after its sole power distributor MORE Power lost its supply from the grid.

MORE Power draws its supply from coal-fired power plants owned by Kepco and Sem Calaca, which were operational during the outage. But since NGCP cannot transmit electricity from these plants, city residents and workers had to suffer a sweltering Monday.

The outage also affected nearby Guimaras Island.

In a 6 p.m. advisory, MORE Power said it managed to restore power supply to several feeders in Lapaz, Molo, City Proper, Jaro, Mandurriao and the Megaworld area.

“Please note that additional feeders will be energized as soon as we receive the necessary Mega Watt (MW) from NGCP,” it added.

The unexplained outage occurred on the heels of the 12-hour scheduled brownout that hit parts of Iloilo City over the weekend due to maintenance works by NGCP.