‘OF BRIDGES AND POWER’: Panay ‘mega’ bridge, Visayas grid connection highlighted in SONA

By Joseph Bernard A. Marzan

The Panay-Guimaras-Negros (PGN) Bridge and the Cebu-Negros-Panay interconnection were some of the priority projects mentioned by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in his second State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Monday.

The PGN Bridge was just one of the structures specifically mentioned by the president under his Mega Bridge Program, which features 12 bridges spanning 90 kilometers that will connect islands in various parts of the country.

The two other bridges mentioned in the SONA were the Bataan-Cavite Interlink Bridge which connects two opposite sides of Manila Bay, and the Samal Island-Davao City Connector Bridge which crosses the Pakiputan Strait and connects with the island Samal City in Davao del Norte.

The program is just one component of the Marcos Jr. administration’s ₱8.3-trillion peso Build Better More program.

“Our infrastructure spending will be at 5 to 6 percent of our [Gross Domestic Product]. Our road network plans must link not only our 3 major islands, but all prospective sites of economic development,” the president said in his speech.

The Korean Export-Import Bank (KEXIM) loaned the Philippine government $56.6 billion Economic Development Cooperation for the detailed engineering design (DED) of the bridge, according to a news release by the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) on November 10, 2022.

Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas, who heads the Regional Development Council’s (RDC) Infrastructure Development Committee (IDC), said in his regular Monday press conference that the contract for the DED was awarded recently, but he did not provide other details.

The DPWH’s online procurement section has not yet indicated any contract awarded on the project.

The department started bidding out the consulting process for the DED on May 24, 2022 when it requested for expression of interest, and requested for proposals on December 27, 2022.

DPWH Secretary Manuel Bonoan formed a Review Team (RT) and a Technical Working Group (TWG) for the DED via Special Order No. 49 on March 1.

The RT will be in-charge of decision-making on the recommendations of the TWG, which are composed of project managers, engineers, and environmental management specialists of the DPWH.

Its last update on the project was Supplemental Bid Bulletin No. 4 dated February 27, 2023, which set the expected date for the commencement of consulting services on June 23, 2023.

The National Economic and Development Authority-Region 6 (NEDA-6) in March said that physical works on the 32-kilometer bridge are expected to start in 2025.

Daily Guardian has reached out to DPWH-Western Visayas Assistant Regional Director Jose Al Fruto for further information, but he has yet to respond as of this writing.

Meanwhile, Marcos Jr. also called on the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP), the private concessionaire to complete the Cebu-Negros-Panay (CNP) interconnection.

The interconnection includes a 230-kilovolt backbone which would accommodate excess power from Panay and Negros Islands to the rest of Visayas.

It is seen to complement the Mindanao-Visayas interconnection (MVIP), which was also mentioned in the SONA, and would be the final piece in a unified power grid in the country.

Department of Energy Secretary Raphael Perpetuo Lotilla said in a forum in March that the CNP interconnection would be finished by June 30, 2023. But the SONA somehow indicates that this project was far from done.

Marcos Jr.’s discussion of the CNP comes almost 3 months after Western Visayas suffered an almost week-long power outage in April, a matter that was blamed on NGCP’s handling of the grid in Panay and Negros.

The company later pointed to a fault in the lines of the Central Negros Electric Cooperative (CENECO) as the source of the outage, but it later rectified that the cooperative was not to blame.

The RDC in May 2023 passed a resolution urging the NGCP to fast-track the CNP project, as well as to install 3 100-megavolt-ampere substations and transmission lines by 2024 to avoid foreseen rotational outages in Iloilo City.

In a statement shortly after the SONA, NGCP committed to finishing the projects this year but did not provide updates on the CNP.

“Among the top priorities on NGCP’s agenda are the swift completion of the Mindanao-Visayas Interconnection Project (MVIP) and Stage 3 of the Cebu-Negros-Panay Interconnection Project (CNP). Both crucial projects have been partially energized, with the MVIP on track to be fully energized to 450 megawatts by the third quarter of this year,” NGCP said.

In a statement, Treñas thanked Marcos Jr., stating that Iloilo City will benefit from the development and eventual completion of these projects.

“The Panay-Negros-Guimaras Bridge has long been a dream for us. With this coming to fruition, ease of transportation, dynamic movement of goods and services, and much enhanced economic and tourism activities are assured,” the mayor said in his statement.

“The Cebu-Negros-Panay interconnection in the NGCP grid is a truly welcome development as we are hoping to finally have stable energy source, transmission and distribution,” he added.

These two projects are on top of the other projects in the region that are included in the Marcos Jr. administration’s priority list – the revival of Panay Railways mentioned in last year’s SONA, and the Iloilo-Capiz-Aklan Expressway (ICAEX) listed in the DPWH’s Public-Private Partnership (PPP) projects last year.

Both projects are still in their “prenatal” stages, with consulting services for the railway system’s revival yet to be awarded by the Department of Transportation and the ICAEX included in the DPWH’s list of priority projects proposed for implementation under Republic Act No. 6957, as amended (Build-Operate-Transfer law) in January this year.