[Part II] Of Solar Queens and Phantom Grids

The Second Installment in the ERC Chronicles

The ERC, under Chair Monalisa Dimalanta, continues its unlikely transformation from regulatory wallflower to reformist headliner. And this time, the spotlight is real—not powered by diesel, but by the swelling tide of rooftop solar.

National Grid or National 'Greed' Corporation of the Philippines? (Photo:  NGCP Facebook)

Net metering, once a technical buzzword uttered only in clean energy symposiums, is now a barangay-level aspiration. Uptake has soared 152.91%, climbing from 6,791 Qualified End-users (QEs) in 2022 to over 17,000 by May 2025.

The ERC did not merely regulate—they activated: launching tripartite one-stop shops with LGUs and DUs in Pasig, Iloilo, and Quezon City. Bureaucratic molasses has been replaced by checklists and front desks that actually function.

Meanwhile, the Green Energy Option Program (GEOP) has bloomed like an honest-to-goodness utility flower—available to contestable customers who finally have options beyond the grid overlords.

The ERC, in short, is now a legitimate force for transition.

But while sunlight flows freely, transmission charges remain clouded by something less transparent.

Let us now pivot—uncomfortably but necessarily—to the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines.

Or, as it might be rendered in an accidental slip of the tongue, the National Greed Corporation, whose interpretation of “public service” reads like a financier’s fantasy novel.

Let’s start with the big number: ₱130 billion. That is the staggering amount NGCP has charged to consumers, with line items that would be comic—if they weren’t quietly legal-ish.

Advertising expenses? You read that right. For a monopoly. One must admire the logic: spend ₱1 billion to tell the public they have no other choice.

CSR projects? Noble in theory. But why are we—the consumers—funding the company’s good deeds? Shouldn’t these come from the lush garden of their profits, not our electric bills?

Employee benefits? Surely an internal cost, right? Not if you’re NGCP. If your Christmas party is lit by fairy lights, chances are, we paid for them.

This is not just regulatory capture. This is creative extraction—turning line items into lifelines, and profit into policy.

And what makes this particularly galling is the double-delay maneuver. Not only are projects behind schedule, but their projected costs are already baked into our bills. We are paying today for what might arrive in 2028—assuming it ever gets built.

This is a company that has weaponized the future, billing us for its intentions. NGCP has become a master of metaphysical accounting: monetizing possibility, rewarding postponement, and redefining deliverables as dreamables.

Chair Dimalanta, for her part, continues to try threading a moral needle through a bureaucratic haystack. But how do you regulate a utility whose pricing model seems to be powered by hope, hubris, and holiday bonuses?

The ERC may hand out bouquets, but we cannot ignore the other smell emanating from the grid. It is not ozone. It is not reform.

It is the stench of a system where greed isn’t just allowed—it’s itemized.

But here’s the spark that dims the grid: Chair Monalisa Dimalanta will no longer be at the ERC to flag these feats of accounting acrobatics. The lone regulatory voice who dared ask why a monopoly needs a jingle—has exited the building.

Consumers, once cautiously hopeful, now find themselves bracing for bills padded with “to-dos,” karaoke fundraisers, and corporate PR campaigns labeled as “grid development.”

In the face of this growing unease, perhaps it is time—as energy costs continue to shape household budgets and investor confidence alike—for a quiet memo to find its way to the Palace.

Not alarmist. Not dramatic. Just a polite nudge that says: “Mr. President, the people are paying for wires that were never strung. Might we check the circuits?”

Because if no one steps in, the NGCP’s business model of monetized delay may yet become the most expensive fiction in the Filipino consumer's life—one billed monthly, in kilowatt-hours and resignation.