Power spot market prices up in June

SPOT market prices increased in June as power demand started to pick up, following the easement of the quarantine restrictions in parts of Luzon and Visayas, the Independent Electricity Market Operator of the Philippines Inc. (Iemop) said.

In a briefing, IEMOP Chief Operating Officer Robinson Descanzo reported that effective spot settlement price (ESSP) last month settled at P3.25 per kilowatt hour, higher than P2.19 per kWh in May, citing its preliminary data for the period.

The main driver, he said, is the increase in demand, specifically between the second week or June 2 to 6.

Descanzo told reporters that demand in June was higher than May “because

lift ECQ, nag-GCQ na tayo and then some of the establishments, commercial and industrial resume operation

(this was the time where parts of the country transitioned from enhanced community quarantine to general community quarantine and then some of the establishments have resumed operations).”

In March, the government placed many parts of the country under quarantine to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 ( Covid- 19). About two months later, lockdown restrictions were further eased in a move to spur economic activities in the country.

Also, Iemop recorded price spikes since certain power plants went on forced and scheduled outages during the period.

To recall, yellow alert was raised in Luzon as many power facilities went offline and the Malampaya gas field’s natural gas supply was restricted. A yellow alert is raised when reserves are less than the capacity of the largest plant online, which is 647 megawatts (MW) for Luzon.

Data from Iemop showed that average power demand for the past month was 10,174 MW against 9,304 MW in May.

Peak demand in the two regions reached 12,611 MW in June from 11,567 MW a month ago.

Meanwhile, the average supply for June stood at 13,794 MW, slightly higher than 13,245 MW in the previous month.