Manila: The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) announced that the Mindanao power grid was placed under a red alert on Wednesday afternoon as available supply fell short of grid requirements.
According to Philippines News Agency, in its 2 p.m. bulletin, the NGCP upgraded the grid status from yellow to red alert from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. and from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. A yellow alert was raised for specific periods: 12 p.m. to 1 p.m., from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m., and 8 p.m. to 9 p.m.
The NGCP reported that the grid's available capacity dropped to around 2,526 megawatts (MW) from 2,630 MW earlier in the day. At the same time, the expected peak demand increased to 2,545 MW from 2,487 MW. The situation was compounded by the outage of Unit 1 of GNPower Kauswagan (GNPK) and Unit 2 of Therma South, Inc. (TSI).
The NGCP issues a yellow alert when a grid's operating margin is insufficient to meet contingency requirements. A red alert is raised when the existing supply cannot provide adequate electricity for consumer demand and the transmission grid's regulating requirements.
For this month alone, seven power plants in Mindanao are offline, while more than 20 have been non-operational since 2024. Additionally, seven power plants are operating at derated capacities, resulting in a loss of 855.1 MW to the grid.
Meanwhile, the Visayas grid was placed under a red alert from 2 p.m. to 10 p.m. A yellow alert is also in effect from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. and from 10 p.m. to 11 p.m. Available power supply for Visayas dropped to 2,139 MW from 2,205 MW earlier, while expected peak demand rose to 2,555 MW from 2,501 MW.
