MANILA -- The Energy Regulation Commission (ERC) is looking at a lower secondary price cap (SPC) in the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) to counter spikes in electricity prices.
It recalculated the secondary price cap in the WESM at PHP4,502 per megawatt-hour (MWh) from the existing PHP6,245/MWh.
Commissioner Catherine Maceda said the intention is not to unreasonably stifle the market growth but instead to come up with a better competition to happen.
"However, we have to realize that we also have the consumers into rest that we need to protect," she said Monday during the price cap public consultation.
The hearing was called after the persistent alert warnings on thinning reserve power from March to June 2019.
In determining the secondary price cap, ERC used the process of recalculation utilizing the same methodology applied under Resolution No. 04, Series of 2014, which adopted and made permanent the pre-emptive mitigating measure in the WESM.
ERC drafted a resolution adopting amendments to the pre-emptive mitigating measure in the WESM.
The draft resolution said the recent developments in the electricity market impelled the ERC to review existing threshold levels of the secondary price cap schemes, and recalculate the same based on current market data using the period 2016 to 2018.
The recalculated cumulative price threshold (CPT) level to PHP6,919/MWh equivalent to the generator weighted average price over a rolling three-day period or 72-hour trading interval in the WESM.
ERC urged stakeholders to submit their written comments on the draft resolution until Nov. 22.
Victorio Mario Dimagiba, president of Laban Konsyumer Inc., said the WESM market is “very sensitive” to supply consumption situations.
"We in the consumers' group, anything lower than what it is, of course, we support," he said.
"The regulatory actions should be synergized, we should cooperate and those enforcement actions coupled with the price cap, and that should be really supporting consumers’ welfare." (PNA)
