BAGUIO CITY– The Benguet Electric Cooperative (BENECO) will continue to take appropriate measures to prevent the serious negative impact when the power-supply agreement entered into by the rural electric cooperative and a Sual-based power generator, Tokyo Energy and Marubeni Energy (TEAM) Corporation, lapses on March 2024, especially on the prevailing power rates within its franchise area.
BENECO general manager Gerardo P. Verzosa said the consumers of the electric cooperative should start to be informed and educated on the complex power industry to understand the intricacies of the trade and help mitigating the effects of the expiration of the existing power-supply agreement with TEAM Energy, a Sual-based coal-fired power plant.
He pointed out BENECO’s power-supply agreement with TEAM Energy will expire in March 2024 and the over 130,000 residential and commercial consumers of the cooperative can still enjoy cheap power prices up to the said date.
Earlier, BENECO and TEAM Energy Corporation entered into a power-supply agreement for BENECO to purchase its power requirements from TEAM Energy Corp., of approximately 55 million to 70 million megawatts per month at a price of P3.85 per kilowatt-hour up to March 2024.
The BENECO official pointed out policy makers and decision makers should be circumspect in coming out with their decisions on how to handle the situation so that the increasing number of consumers will continue to enjoy cheap power rates as what is currently happening at the moment.
In 2017, BENECO charge its consumers P3.93 average generation charge while Meralco, one of the biggest private power distribution utility that serves 60 percent of the consumers in the Luzon grid, sold power to its consumers at over P4 per kilowatt-hour. In 2018, BENECO charged its consumers P4.00 per kilowatt-hour while Meralco charged over P5.00 in generation charge and for the first 11 months of the year, BENECO continues to maintain a low generation charge compared to that being collected by Meralco.
Verzosa pointed out the challenge to the remaining BENECO officials is how to negotiate a power-supply agreement beneficial to the greater interest of residential and commercial consumers within its franchise area.
According to him, BENECO is experiencing an annual 3 percent increase in its load demand that represents the increase in consumers in the different parts of Baguio and Benguet.
Verzosa asserted the complex power industry is becoming highly competitive with the rapid advancement of technology and BENECO is able to hurdle these challenges even as it strives to provide the consumers with cheap power rates to remain competitive.
BENECO is one of the few multi-awarded Class AAA rural electric cooperatives in the country with its performance far more exceeding that of other private power distribution and similarly situated cooperatives involved in the highly competitive business of providing cheap power to people in the country.
By HENT
