The international non-government organization, Institute for Climate and Sustainable Cities (ICSC) has warned that yellow and red alerts over possible brownouts or power supply interruptions will likely be raised in the country in the middle of 2025, despite an “oversupply” of baseload capacity.
In a briefing in Quezon City on Thursday, April 3, the ICSC said it based its warning on its own report, showing that most baseload power plants can suffer from outages as they are being forced to ramp up and down their generation despite being programmed to operate 24×7.
Yellow alerts are issued when the level of power reserve in the grid is low while red alerts are declared when actual power supply against demand is insufficient and power interruptions are imminent.
“Although elevated electricity demand during the summer contributes to power supply issues experienced in these months, forced outages of baseload power plants have constantly exacerbated the situation,” said Jephraim Manansala, ICSC’s chief data scientist and co-author of the report.
On Wednesday, April 2, the Department of Energy (DOE) assured the public of stable power supply during the summer months and the May midterm elections.
However, DOE Assistant Secretary Mario Marasigan said the agency would not remove the possibility of raising yellow and red alerts in case of lean power supply. He hastened to add such alerts would not automatically lead to power service interruptions.
The ICSC report found that the Luzon grid will likely have normal reserves in April, with yellow alerts possible in May and red alerts possible in June.
The Luzon grid is projected to export power to the Visayas grid through the 250 megawatts (MW) high voltage direct current interconnection from March 31 to June 1, to ensure sufficient reserves in Visayas.
However, the ICSC said the Luzon grid will need to restrict exports on June 2 to 8, as this is the period of tightest supply for the region, given the reduced coal generation of around 842 MW forecasted by the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, and the Department of Energy, potentially leading to red alert levels for the grid.
Meanwhile, the ICSC said the Visayas grid is expected to maintain normal reserves in the second quarter, but remains heavily dependent on imports from Luzon and Mindanao. The report also claimed that yellow alerts are possible for the region in June, as Luzon may restrict exports due to inadequate power supply in that period.
ICSC added that Visayas presents a unique case as it is composed of five large island grids that are interconnected by transmission lines of varying capacities, resulting in transmission constraints among the islands.
However, Manansala said the Mindanao grid is projected to maintain normal reserves from April to June and is capable of exporting power, particularly to Visayas because of its large power supply.
The ICSC said issues in the reliability and sufficiency of power supply could be resolved if the government would slap higher penalties on power utilities performing below par, and if an optimal power mix would be pursued with a focus on distributed and flexible power generation.
“We do not need more baseload capacity. In my opinion, we will not need it in the next three to five years. Distributed and flexible systems are what we need so long as these will be spread throughout the country,” said Alberto Dalusung III, ICSC energy transition advisor.
The ICSC said solar and wind power plants with battery capacities as well as biomass-fired power projects are among current technologies considered as distributed and flexible systems that can fill up gaps in power supply.
“We also need an optimal power mix with the right balance between baseload, mid-merit and peaking. We have too much baseload,” said Atty. Pedro Maniego Jr., the ICSC senior policy advisor.
Baseload plants are power plants meant to run 24×7. Mid-merit plants are those capable of easily adjusting their output depending on demand while peaking power plants are those that can easily generate instant power when demand suddenly spikes.
Based on the latest data from the DOE, as of the end of 2024, the total share of both on-grid and off-grid baseload capacities in the country, composed of coal and geothermal, was at 14,988 MW or 49.1 percent of the country’s total power supply mix at 30,513 MW.
Meanwhile, mid-merit capacity from natural gas-fired power plants and biomass-fired power plants was at 4,327 MW or 14.2 percent.
On the other hand, peaking capacity from oil-based power plants was at 4,164 MW or 13.6 percent of the mix.
All other remaining renewable energy plants, composed of solar, hydro and wind power, totalled 7,035 or 23.1 percent of the power mix for the period.
The ICSC is an international non-government group based in the Philippines that has been advancing “fair climate policy and low carbon, climate-resilient development,” its official website said. The ICSC website states it is focused on Asia and is recognized for helping advance “effective global climate action and the Paris climate agreement.”
