MANILA, Philippines — The National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) has placed the Visayas grid under a yellow alert for one hour on Thursday as reduced power plant availability and higher electricity demand narrowed the system's operating reserve.
The yellow alert will be in effect from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m., when available generating capacity is projected to be at 2,756 megawatts (MW) against an expected peak demand of 2,496 MW.
The NGCP attributed the alert to the continued unavailability of Therma Visayas Inc.'s coal-fired generating units 1 and 2, as well as higher demand during the evening peak period.
The grid operator also reported that 25 power plants were either offline or operating below their rated capacities.
Of these, four generating units have been on forced outage since July, four since June, seven since May, one since March, three since 2025, three since 2024, two since 2023 and one since 2021.
it said 18 generating units were operating on derated capacities.
A yellow alert is declared when the operating margin is insufficient to meet the transmission grid's contingency reserve requirement, indicating that the power system has limited reserve capacity but electricity supply remains available.
