Regulate the grid!

TRANSCO, the state-owned national transmission company which controls and maintains the power grid, has a net income of at least 1.2 billion pesos a month.

Now, there is a report of a fellow electrical engineer — a young 2004 graduate — which says that TRANSCO is passing on a 2.98% system loss of its own to Meralco, which presumably passes it on to us, its ultimate consumers. This could probably explain the P2.5 billion that Meralco says is its under-recoveries from TRANSCO charges from August 2007 to March 2008, which presumably it will collect from its consumers.

I haven’t found time yet to get the necessary hard data and analyze them, but if you want to get a preview of this young graduate’s major points, you can read it in this url:

http://www.jcmiras.net/surge/p100.htm

In the meantime, with apologies to Neri/Lozada, we just say: regulate the grid!

BTW, TRANSCO has been privatized recently. The concession has been won by the Monte Oro consorftium which includes business groups owned by Enrique Razon, a person believed to be close to Malacanang.