The Grid and the Invisible Costs

There is a quiet line item on every electric bill that few ever read closely — transmission charges, the price we pay to move power through the national grid.

And perhaps it is time, too, for President Marcos to rein in the greed — er, the grid — before it overruns the public it was meant to serve. Leadership must step in where regulation has lagged, to make sure that power remains a service, not a scheme. (Photos: Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs / National Grid Corporation of the Philippines Facebook) 

It looks small on paper but carries a massive weight in reality — an artery of money feeding the projects of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP).

NGCP has asked the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) to approve ₱93.675 billion for thirteen new transmission projects nationwide: from the ₱44-billion Cebu–Leyte Interconnection Lines 3 and 4 to substations in Sta. Maria, Magalang, and Pinamucan, and collector stations stretching from Tuguegarao to the Visayas.

These belong to the fifth regulatory period — the latest round in the never-ending expansion of the grid.

The company says the projects are aligned with the Department of Energy’s transmission development plan and are “necessary to accommodate new power projects.”

It has asked the ERC for provisional approval so construction can begin as soon as the regulator gives the nod.

That is the official story. The unspoken one lies in how these costs eventually flow back to us — and in how, somewhere along the way, the grid began to rhyme too easily with greed.

Transmission projects are capital-heavy. Once approved, their costs are recovered through the wheeling charges embedded in our monthly bills.

When those projects are delayed — or never completed on schedule — the danger is that consumers end up paying for capacity that doesn’t yet exist. It is the financial equivalent of being billed for a bridge still half-built.

In the last regulatory cycle, the ERC pared NGCP’s proposed revenue from ₱552 billion to ₱335 billion, adopting an “as-spent” method and an 11.33 percent weighted cost of capital.

Even so, decisions came years late, calculations went stale, and the public remained blind to how much of each peso represented actual steel and cable — and how much was simply accounting momentum.

Every postponed line or substation becomes a double loss: electricity that cannot reach homes and factories, and interest costs that keep mounting.

Then, when long-delayed projects are bundled and resubmitted — as they are now — there is the temptation to roll yesterday’s inefficiencies into tomorrow’s rates. What began as a delay becomes, quietly, a dividend.

No one disputes the need for new transmission lines; modernization is essential. But modernization without verification breeds' mistrust. Before another peso is passed on to the public, we need plain answers:

1. How much of the ₱93 billion reflects real, updated construction costs?

2. What mechanism ensures that padded or obsolete estimates are clawed back?

3. Who certifies that a project’s “completion” matches what ratepayers already financed?

The grid is not merchandise; it is a shared lifeline. Its costs should behave like public trust — visible, verifiable, and revisable.

The ERC can restore confidence by publishing a table that tracks every project: proposed cost, approved cost, percentage complete, and the date consumers began paying for it. Transparency is not hostility; it is hygiene.

And perhaps it is time, too, for President Marcos to rein in the greed — er, the grid — before it overruns the public it was meant to serve.

Leadership must step in where regulation has lagged, to make sure that power remains a service, not a scheme.

Until that happens, each electric bill will remain a small act of faith — citizens paying for power, unsure whether they are also paying for ghosts. And faith, once overcharged, is the hardest energy to restore.

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