In a three-page order penned by Commissioner Alejandro Z. Barin, the Commission reckoned that it would be appropriate for the time being "to suspend the confirmation process of the AGRA (Automatic Generation Rate Adjustment) for DUs."

This mandate, it said, will be in force until such time that the Supreme Court renders final ruling on the pending case against Manila adjustment mechanism (GRAM) charges.

The ERC clarified that the DUs can still pass on and submit documents that would justify their AGRA cost recoveries; but action or evaluation of the amounts recouped would be deferred.

The AGRA is a successor of GRAM, which prescribes automatic recovery of generation charge adjustments on a monthly basis, in contrast to the deferred cost recovery which normally suffers from sixmonth lag before they could finally be passed on to end-consumers.

Meanwhile, apprehensions are hurled that electricity consumers are bound to suffer from new round of increases in power rates if the high court decides with finality to scrap the prescribed generation charge recovery scheme; since this posits a scenario where the industry will need to revert back to the regime of the dreaded purchased power adjustment or the PPA.

In the face of uncertainties baffling the industry, Energy Secretary Raphael P.M. Lotilla revealed that he will be meeting with distribution utilities, primarily the Private Electric Power Operators Association (PEPOA), to assess the implication of the SC ruling on probability of the GRAM cost recovery being rendered ineffective, especially with some inference that such might trigger increases in power rates, contrary to a refund scenario being played up by consumer groups.

In the case of National Power Corporation (NPC) which traditionally recoups adjustments in its generation charges via the fuel purchase and power cost adjustment (FPCA), an equivalent of PPA, officials see more of a scenario that its rates will go up as a result of the SC ruling, if GRAM is junked.

"We are carefully studying the decision. If GRAM is declared ineffective, then we have to look back at the set-up prior to the GRAM, and that was the FPCA or PPA regime," said NPC president Cyril C. del Callar.