Unit at First Gen’s Sta Rita plant back in operation

LOPEZ-LED First Gen Corp. (First Gen) said on Wednesday that Unit 20 of its 1,000- megawatt (MW) Santa Rita combined cycle power plant in Santa Rita, Batangas is now back in operation.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, First Gen said the replacement of the unit’s damaged main generator transformer with a spare main transformer has been completed.

Unit 20 is one of four 250-MW units of the Sta. Rita power plant, which is owned by First Gas Power Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of First Gen.

Unit 20 was under scheduled maintenance outage from July 23 to August 26 for works, including maintenance activities on the transformer. But during the one-month maintenance, a fault occurred in the main transformer which was immediately investigated.

The said unit was among the nine power plants that were out when a series of yellow and red alerts were raised in the Luzon grid by the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) from July 25 to 29.

A yellow alert status means that contingency reserves are below the minimum level set by the regulator, but does not necessarily lead to power outages. A red alert means there is severe power

The Sta. Rita plant currently supplies electricity to the country’s largest power distribution utility, Manila Electric Co. (Meralco).