NGCP tasked to put contingencies in energy devt plan

The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) was tasked to include contingency measures in its energy development plan in case disasters like Japan's 9.0-magnitude earthquake should hit the country, Senator Gregorio Honasan on Thursday said in an interview. In Thursday's congressional inquiry, Honasan asked NGCP president Henry Sy Jr. whether his company took into account the possibility of disasters in their power transmission and energy development plans. "Ako nagtanong kung before they crafted the energy development plan na-factor na yung nangyari sa Japan (I asked if before they crafted the energy development plan, they factored in what had happened in Japan)," he told GMA News Online. The senator said he wanted to know if the company has contingencies that would ensure a steady and reasonably priced supply of electricity for the consumers. While the NGCP, which operates the high-voltage transmission lines from power generating firms to suppliers and distributors, has no immediate answer to his query, Honasan said the company promised to prepare and submit a report on the matter for the joint congressional power commission. The NGCP operates 19,425 circuit-kilometers of high-voltage transmission and sub-transmission lines and 23,853 megavolt amperes of substation capacity in Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. In a separate statement Thursday, Sy said that they have started "frontloading" the money for the P24-billion Leyte-Mindanao Interconnection Project (LMIP). The LMIP is designed to further stabilize the supply and enhance the quality of electricity across the country by connecting the Visayas and Mindanao grids via 23 kilometers of submarine cables linking the Leyte and Surigao substations. — VS GMA News