The Manila Electric Company (Meralco) on Wednesday retracted its earlier projection of decline after the distribution utility (DU) announced a slight increase in power rate for January.
In an advisory, Meralco said there will be an upward adjustment of PHP0.0846 per kilowatt hour (kWh) this month, which will bring the overall rate to PHP11.3430 per kWh from PHP11.2584 in December 2023.
“For residential customers consuming 200 kWh, the adjustment is equivalent to a minimal increase of around PHP17 in their total electricity bill,” it said.
Meralco said it implemented a slight rate hike due to an increase in transmission charges which offset the decline in generation charge.
The DU attributed the increase to higher power costs from the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM), which went up by PHP0.5611 per kWh due to higher average capacity on outage in the Luzon grid, and from Independent Power Producers (IPP), which increased by PHP0.1384 per kWh because of higher fuel costs of First Gas amid the use of imported liquefied natural gas.
IPP and WESM supplied 36.5 and 20.5 percent of Meralco’s power requirement.
“Our earlier projection of a lower generation charge would have resulted in lower overall rates. However, the steep upward adjustment in the transmission charge effectively wiped out the reduction in generation charges causing a slight uptick in overall rates,” Meralco Vice President and Head of Corporate Communications Joe Zaldarriaga said in a statement.
Meanwhile, net transmission and other charges also declined by PHP0.0290 per kWh, while distribution charges have remained steady at PHP0.0360 per kWh since August 2022.
