ENLIGHTENING NEGROS: Negros – RE Capital? Or Energy Parasite?

Last July 6, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) executed a manual load dropping on Panay Island after the newly rehabilitated Negros-Panay submarine cable was tripped. As a result, the incident also caused unscheduled power outages in some areas in Negros Occidental. To put it simply, the only thing Negros can do is wait and hope for the best every time transmission cables and generation plants in Panay and Cebu experience damage or malfunctions. That is simply pathetic, ridiculous, and unacceptable.

Intentional or not, power outages cause varied economic and social impacts. For industries and businesses, they would lose revenue from the stall in operation and overall productivity is also decreased.

Minutes or hours may sound insignificant but when you consolidate it annually, the effect of an outage is consequentially significant and notable. Moreover, the effect of an outage is more significant on the average consumer. Small businesses in our peri-urban towns and cities suffer the greatest from outages.

The meat and fish of market vendors can spoil, the carpenter and construction worker can’t use power tools, and the teacher cannot teach an online class. Though a day worth of wage or income is quantifiably small compared to the millions that can be lost by corporations, struggling individuals and small businesses may take days to recover from the effects of a power outage, and the effects on their families are more direct. The unquantifiable and indirect effect is also great on individuals and families. When there is a power outage; infants, the elderly, and sick people are harder to care for, and students will find it harder to study and comply with schoolwork that requires electronic devices.

The incident is a clear verification of why we must take our energy security problem seriously. On top of having unstable electricity, we also have some of the highest electricity rates in the country. As of this writing, Central Negros Electric Cooperative (CENECO) charges their residential subscribers ₱ 12.1/kWh, Negros Occidental Electric Cooperative (NOCECO) charges ₱13.8/kWh, and Northern Negros Electric Cooperative (NONECO) charges ₱ 14.4/kWh. These rates are very high compared to the ₱9.4/kWh national average. Again, our situation is simply pathetic, ridiculous, and unacceptable.

Do you still remember when we listened to the people who said that the coal plant is an existential threat to our way of life and that RE is the hope? Where are they now? All their promises were either under-delivering or they never materialized at all. At present, solar is still sporadic, volatile, and not competitive.

Most of these solar farms would simply close if they wouldn’t be subsidized and be given special treatment by the government. At present, our existing technologies are telling us that a solar-dependent future is very far from reality but many of us are still in strong denial over that fact. And as a mere spectator in the solar research and development race, Negros should strongly consider a paradigm shift toward conventional energy sources and decrease dependency on dilute and intermittent solar.

If you’re a Negrense who still thinks that a 100% RE Negros is the right endeavor to pursue, please rethink your existence. You are privileged enough to be spoiled and entitled in a poor and developing country. You are far removed from the harsh realities of the people around you. You are gullible and naive, and you lack critical thinking even on the most basic of issues. You do more virtue signaling than actual environmentalism. You are the problem!

So, what now? BUILD AN IN-ISLAND BASELOAD! With rapidly growing demands, Negros’ aging geothermal baseload is clearly overwhelmed with Negros Oriental’s demand alone. A modern and efficient baseload like the liquified natural gas (LNG) powerplant that is being proposed that can produce 24/7 electricity is critically necessary.* (Raymund Besa)