Power transmission rates fall by 28.4%; monthly bills ease

Transmission rates account for about 10 percent of a monthly electricity bill. Photo from NGCP

MANILA, Philippines — Consumers will see lower transmission charges in their May power bills. This, as the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP) announced a 28.45-percent drop in transmission rates.

The operator of the country’s power grid said the overall average transmission rates decreased to P1.0904 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) from P1.524 per kWh a month ago.

Transmission rates account for about 10 percent of a monthly electricity bill.

The decrease came as both transmission wheeling rates and ancillary services (AS) rates saw reductions.

NGCP only charges for delivering power, or the transmission wheeling rates.

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“For the May 2025 electric bill of the end consumers, NGCP charges only 46 centavos per kWh for the delivery of its services,” said Julius Ryan Datingaling. He heads NGCP’s business and regulatory development team.

Datingaling said the “bulk” of transmission charges would go to ancillary services. This is the cost of energy sourced from the reserve market as well as generators on contract with NGCP.

The grid operator taps these suppliers when regular sources cannot provide a sufficient supply.

Also, ancillary service rates dropped by 36.07 percent to P0.5175 per kWh from P0.8094 per kWh.

Lower power transmission rates reflect on monthly bills

Manila Electric Co. on Tuesday announced a reduction of 75-centavos per kWh in power rates for May. 

This brought the utility giant’s overall rate for a typical household to P12.2628 per kWh from P13.0127 per kWh in April.

Meanwhile, NGCP spokesperson Cynthia Alabanza said they have yet to receive the official copy of the decision of the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) regarding its fourth regulatory period.

“We need to assess the issuance as a whole to be able to see whether that will be supportive of the infrastructure requirements of the country or not,” she told reporters.

Almost a month ago, the ERC said it had finally completed the rate reset of the NGCP. The maximum allowable revenue was set at P335.78 billion for 2016 to 2022.

This would translate to P28.29 billion in unrecovered amounts that NGCP spent on transmission projects.