Iloilo power utility: PECO lied to ERC

ILOILO City’s power utility More Electric and Power Corp. (MORE Power) has accused old utility and rival Panay Electric Co. (PECO) of lying before the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) by altering power outage numbers in Iloilo City.

“PECO manipulated the MORE numbers to artificially inflate the figures. PECO not only double counted, it counted one brownout period 16 times. PECO included in its count two brownouts that did not happen. PECO also counted a longer period than the actual period of brownout,” MORE Power said in its reply to a petition filed by PECO with the ERC requesting the restoration of its certification of public convenience and necessity.

MORE Power responded to the allegations of PECO that Iloilo City experienced 1,424 minutes of power outages from February 29 up to July 16, 2020 based on

MORE Power’s Facebook updates.

PECO claimed MORE Power’s own social media report showed that the accumulated power outages for this period was much higher than the system average interruption duration index (SAIDI) of PECO for the same period in 2019.

In reaction, MORE Power said PECO lied to the ERC because it engaged in “multiple counting,” which was not in accordance with the mandated method of recording interruptions under ERC Resolution 12, Series of 2008 (A Resolution Adopting the Guidelines for the Monitoring of Reliability Standards for Distribution Utilities).

Under MORE Power’s watch from February 29 to July 16, 2020, there have been a total of only 182.13 hours of power interruptions, not 412.20 hours as alleged by PECO.