Malaya plant’s unit 1 back into operations following rehabilitation

While its targeted completion slipped from original schedule, the generating unit 1 of the 650-megawatt Malaya thermal power plant was finally synchronized back to the grid last week.

Facility owner Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corporation (PSALM) announced this via a media statement, emphasizing that the generating unit’s grid synchronization was achieved last August 26.

PSALM President Lourdes S. Alzona said the ‘overhauling’ at the facility had already been concluded. It must be recalled that this was awarded to Korean firm STX Marine Services Co. Ltd. which is also the plant’s Operation and Maintenance (O&M) service contractor.

“With the two units already operational, the Malaya thermal power plant has now more available capacity as it assumes its role as a security plant,” the company chief executive has noted.

It has been the Department of Energy’s proposal to temporary keep the asset under the government’s charge so it can be relied upon for ‘security capacity’ when tight supply smacks the power grid.

The Operation and Maintenance Service Contract (OMSC) of the plant will lapse this month, hence, PSALM auctioned already the next one to interested parties.

The lowest offers so far came from STX Marine and SPC Power Corporation, but both tenders are still under evaluation, according to Alzona.

PSALM has explained that STX Marine “undertook the overhauling of Unit 1, which included the overhauling of the unit’s turbine and generator, circulating water pump, distributed control system and generator AVR (automatic voltage regulator) excitation system.”

As contingency measure to this year’s tight power supply months, the energy department has recently issued a Circular designating the Malaya plant “as a must-run unit in order to address any instability or supply deficiency that may occur as a result of sudden unavailability of any of the operating power plants in the grid.”

The critical periods in the country’s electricity supply may stretch until next year, and with the Malaya facility being lined up as a ‘security asset’, it is expected that with its rehabilitated unit, it can serve that function way better in the coming months.