Semirara Q1 earnings up slightly to P4.6 B

Semirara Mining and Power Corp. reported a three percent improvement in its first quarter earnings to P4.6 billion as the strong coal business more than offset the drop in its power generation business.

Bulk came from the coal segment at P3.58 billion, while SEMCalaca Power Corp. (SCPC) and Southwest Luzon Power Generation Corp. (SLPGC) contributed P589 million and P407 million, respectively.

For its coal business, production rose three percent to 4.1 million tons as a result of higher excavating capacity.

Local demand grew 27 percent on the back of higher requirements from its domestic customers but with lower export sales.

Total coal sales for the quarter decreased by five percent to 3.4 million tons.

However, the five-percent drop in coal sales volume was offset by the 24 percent increase in average selling price with the higher NewCastle coal price index.

The power generation business, on the other hand, saw a 30-percent drop in energy sales due to planned and unplanned shutdown of all its four power units. Total energy sales fell from 825 gigawatt-hours (GWh) to 575 GWh.

However, higher energy average selling price cushioned the impact of the decline in sales volume as revenues from the power generation segment declined by only 14 percent.

During the quarter, SCPC’s unit 1 had an unplanned shutdown for 15 days due to slagging, while unit 2 has been down since Dec. 15, 2017 for a 90-day planned maintenance shutdown. Units 1 and 2 were back online on March 17 and April 8, respectively.

On the other hand, SLPGC’s unit 3 came from a 75-day planned maintenance shut down and was back online on Jan. 14. On March 6, the unit was placed on emergency outage due to abnormal turbine vibration.