Gas price up by 2.40/liter; diesel by 1.90/ liter; power rate going up
As anticipated, oil companies hiked the pump price of gasoline by 2.40 per liter and diesel by 1.90 per liter effective 12:01 a.m. and 6 a.m. respectively yesterday.
Kerosene also increased by 2.15 per liter.
This week’s round of adjustment – the first major price hike for the year – was initiated by French firm Total and followed by Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corporation and Phoenix Petroleum.
Phoenix Petroleum said the increase was “to reflect the movements in the prices of refined petroleum products in the world market.”
But Bayan Muna Rep. Neri Colmenares said oil firms in the country do not have any justifiable reason to jack up prices and chided local oil companies for being “fast to jack up oil prices but are so slow to roll back.”
“Why did the price of oil suddenly surge when oil companies have a buffer stock that was purchased when the price was lower? Worse oil prices are decreasing in the international market but it is increasing here,” he noted.
“Besides the rollbacks they implemented then was not even right because some industry insiders are saying that it should be 1-2 more. Given this situation - and government is also slow in lowering the prices of basic commodities services and transportation, so it is the consumers who are always at the losing end,” Colmenares noted.
He added: “This is the reason why the oil industry should be regulated to prevent this type of price manipulation and added burden to consumers.”
The Department of Energy (DOE) has indicated that since the Philippine market is heavily leaning on product importations, domestic cost movements will just follow international pricing trends.
Power rates up
Manila Electric Company (Meralco) also increased power rates by P0.84 per kilowatt hour (kWh) in its February billing mainly caused by higher generation charge component in the rates.
The company added that other charges in the bills, such as those on transmission, taxes as well as other charges also increased – plus the inclusion of a new line item for renewable energy incentive, which is the Feed-inTariff Allowance (FIT-All).
But Meralco qualified that despite the overall rate at 10.51 per kWh, “this is still lower compared to rates in February 2014, which was at 11.01 per kWh,” – a rate level still affected then by the tail-end of the controversial November-December price spikes.
Meralco explained that the 0.52 per kWh hike in generation charge is due to the confluence of factors in the operations of the power plants – including increased charges in capacities from power supply agreements (PSAs), lower dispatch of some plants and the pressure exerted in Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) prices due to the simultaneous forced and scheduled maintenance of power plants last month. (With a report from Ben R. Rosario)