Lower WESM price cap urged

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines–Consumer advocacy group Citizenwatch is seeking a lower secondary price cap at the Wholesale Electricity Spot Market (WESM) and make it permanent to shield consumers from high electricity rates amid the tight power supply situation and expected plant outages.

In a position paper, Citizenwatch expressed its support to the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) resolution which aims to establish a permanent preemptive mitigating measure in WESM.

According to the consumer group, lowering and requiring the secondary price cap will “limit the electric price spikes that only benefit power producers with millions in windfall profits at the expense of ordinary consumers.”

The price cap is the highest offer that power sellers can provide when selling electricity to the WESM. The supplier with the lowest price will then supply the various distribution utilities’ requirements, but the last offer that will be cleared sets the price on how much the sellers will be paid.

Currently, a secondary price cap takes effect when the average offers of WESM power sellers breach P8.186 per kWh over a 72-hour period. The secondary price ceiling will remain until succeeding offers of power firms drop below the threshold.

Citizenwatch noted that since the implementation of the price cap, millions of electricity consumers have benefited from the savings.