Manila: The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) lifted the yellow alert status for the Visayas Grid by 1 p.m., which had been issued from 5-7 p.m. on Thursday. The alert was lifted after the available capacity in the grid improved to 3,044 megawatts (MW), despite an increase in peak demand to 2,325 MW.

According to Philippines News Agency, the yellow alert status is declared when the margin between available capacity and expected peak demand becomes narrow. Initially, the NGCP had noted that the available capacity was approximately 2,500 MW, while the peak demand was projected to be around 2,301 MW. The Visayas grid faced a total unavailability of 660.5 MW due to nine power plants being on forced outage from April to November, four of which have been on outage since 2024, and two since 2023. Additionally, 18 other plants are running on derated capacities.

The situation worsened on Wednesday with the unavailability of units 1 and 2 of TVI and the emergency shutdown of Leyte Geothermal Power Plant Unit 3 (LGPP 3), which contributed to the yellow alert declaration. TVI is a subsidiary of Aboitiz Power Corporation, and Aboitiz Power confirmed on Wednesday that the unavailability was due to a disruption in its coal handling operations. The company reported that Unit 1 was synchronized back to the grid around 9 p.m.

Despite the yellow alert in the Visayas, the NGCP assured that the Luzon and Mindanao grids are operating under normal conditions.