Ahead of the official announcement of rate adjustments, Manila Electric Co. (Meralco) projects the cost of electricity in its franchise could go up next month.
Joe Zaldarriaga, Meralco spokesman, said in a statement the movement is mainly driven by the price increase observed in the wholesale electricity spot market and the more than 900 megawatts addition in Luzon’s peak demand in March due to warmer temperature and large capacities on outage.
“Daily Luzon load-weighted average price (LWAP) reached P8 per kilowatt hour (kWh) during the week of March 1 and P9 per kWh during the week of March 15. In comparison, the daily LWAP was below P3 per kWh for most of February,” Zaldarriagasaid.
The announcement on the rate adjustment will be made early next month.
Earlier this month, Meralco implemented a P0.3598 per kWh reduction in power rates mainly due to the implementation of a refund to customers.
Meanwhile, Meralco has urged construction companies and contractors to alert the power distributor for planned works near electrical assets such as electric poles and electrical wires and cables to enable it to implement proper safety precautions that will prevent instability of utility poles when excavations are dug, accidental power trips on circuit breakers and transformers or unintentional damage to power lines that could cause power interruptions or electrocution and fatalities.
