State-led National Transmission Corp. (TransCo) on Thursday said that now is not the right time to lower the feed-in tariff (FiT) or the power rates granted to renewable energy developers as the agency is still facing payment backlogs.
“We don’t know if it’s time to lower the cost,” TransCo President Melvin A. Matibag said in a virtual media briefing after the Conference of the Electricity Power Supply Industry (CEPSI) 2021, a regional digital conference on energy wherein TransCo is a member of the host organization.
Under the country’s FiT system, eligible renewable energy (RE) developers of solar, wind, biomass, and run-of-river hydro projects were awarded fixed rates for the electricity they produce.
The guaranteed power rates are collected from electricity users, with TransCo as the designated administrator of the fund collection or the FiT allowance (FiT-All), which it remits to the RE developers.
Mr. Matibag said TransCo was in talks with the developers on how to lower the feed-in tariff until the pandemic broke out in March last year, restricting mobility for industry participants.
“We’re looking at the ways of increasing [the] number of renewable energy [participants] here in the Philippines, so when we have bigger supply, of course, it will lower the prices,” he told reporters.
“However, due to the pandemic, we are again looking at the backlogs of our payments,” he added.
Mr. Matibag said TransCo is trying to maintain a balance between the interest of the renewable energy producers and the consumers.
“And now, the Energy Regulatory Commission came up with a resolution to stop collection, and now we are facing a much bigger payment backlog,” he said. — M. C. Lucenio
