The National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP), the winning National Transmission Corp. (TransCo) concessionaire, is set to take over the operation of the country’s electrical industry backbone.
“We are ready to take over by January 15 and we are excited and honored to be given the privilege of managing the national transmission grid,” a ranking official of Calaca High Power Corp. (CHPC), who asked not to be named, said.
CHPC is part of the NGCP consortium that bagged the right to run the country’s power grid for 25 years for $3.95 billion in a state-auction in December 2006.
CHPC is in the business of operating, managing, maintaining and rehabilitating energy systems and services for gas, steam and electricity
The company’s partners in the consortium are Monte Oro Grid Resources Corp. and State Grid Hong Kong Ltd.
The former is an investment and holding firm led by local businessman Walter Brown while the latter is a wholly owned company of State Grid Corp. of China, the 2nd largest state owned enterprise in the mainland, with more than 145 million customers and annual revenue of more than $107 billion.
The source said that the group is ready set to complete the payment of close to $1 billion of its bid price within the next few days as part of the mandatory 25 percent upfront payment for the transaction.
Of the amount to be remitted, 40 percent will be shouldered by the consortium’s Chinese partners while the rest will be split between the two local partners, the source said.
The balance of NGCP’s offer price for the TransCo concession may be spread over a period of 20 years.
Under a privatized TransCo, the concessionaire will take over the grid’s operations and maintenance while a government entity will be retained to handle administrative concerns such as right-of-way issues hounding the power grid’s facilities, among others.
“We promise to bring in higher level of efficiency, transparency and financial viability to the company,” the CHPC official said.
NGCP has already secured a franchise in Congress as well as a provisional approval from the Energy Regulatory Commission to run the country’s main grid systems late last year
NGCP to take over TransCo
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