Daily brownouts to hit Boracay for 2 months
Resorts and hotels on Boracay Island will be depending on generator sets for most of the next two months because power supply will be cut off due to an ongoing construction of a power sub-station on the island-resort.
The power interruption started August 8 and is estimated to last from 45 to 60 days until the construction of a 30-mva sub-station of the Aklan Electric Cooperative (Akelco) will be completed.
Akelco public relations officer Lovell Juliano said daily power interruptions from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. except on Sundays have been implemented to give way to repairs and construction work of the sub-station.
At least 70 electric posts on the island will be changed from the present 60-foot-tall poles to 70-foot ones.
The construction of the a 30-mva substation is being undertaken at Sito Tambisaan in Barangay Manoc-Manoc at the southern end of the 1,000-hectare island.
The project is intended to stabilize the power supply of the island which has grown significantly because of the tourism boom.
"This project is meant to ensure the power supply reliability on the island and to minimize brownouts and fluctuations," Juliano said in a telephone interview yesterday.
The world-famous tourist destination is currently provided electricity from a power sub-station in Caticlan on the mainland and transmitted through submarine cables.
But the island has repeatedly experienced power supply and fluctuation problems because of damage to submarine cables.
The 10-mva Caticlan sub-station is also overloaded because it supplies the municipalities of Buruanga and Malay where Boracay is located.
Boracay Island alone consumes around 9.55 mw daily and this increases during they peak season from November to May.
Resort and business owners have urged Akelco to fast-track the project because of the increased cost in operating generator sets for 10 hours daily.
"The price of fuel is very high and this would mean additional expenses for business operators," said Loubelle Cann, president of the Boracay Foundation Inc., in a telephone interview.
Cann said they have requested Akelco and the project contractor to double its workforce to shorten the completion time of the project and the power interruption.
"The longer the project takes, the bigger the costs to business operators," said Cann.
They also requested that power interruption be done per area where repairs and construction work are being done instead of the entire island simultaneously.
But Cann said operations of most resorts and hotels remained normal because most of the 400 establishments have generators sets.
It is also low season on the island with fewer guests which allow resorts and hotels not to run the generator sets the whole day.
"We have to live with it because its also for the good of the island once the project is completed Hopefully it will be completed as scheduled before the peak season starts in October," said Cann.