ILOILO CITY, Iloilo, Philippines – The contract with the new power supplier for the Iloilo Provincial Capitol is good as approved, according to Gov. Arthur Defensor Sr. as the provincial government gets ready to sign a contract next week with the Panay Energy Development Corporation (PEDC) as Capitol’s new power supplier starting December 26, 2011.

The contract with Green Core Geothermal Inc., Capitol’s current power supplier, is set to end on December 25.

Since 2007, during the incumbency of former Gov. Niel Tupas Sr., Green Core required Capitol to pay the whole 400,000 kilowatt-hours per month (kWh/mo) regardless of whether or not that amount of power was used by the province or not.

“With PEDC, we will only be paying for our actual power consumption,” Defensor emphasized.

First district board member Macario Napulan said PEDC submitted the lowest offer amongst three bidding power firms that also included Green Core and Panay Electric Co. (PECO).

Napulan said PEDC and PECO both offered the same rate of P10.60 per kilowatt-hour but PEDC was chosen to maximize the Capitol’s P1-million power substation.

“If PECO was chosen, the Capitol’s power substation would be a white elephant. It would be useless. PECO would demand for new transformers,” Napulan explained.

In the contract which Capitol is poised to sign with PEDC, the latter will also be allocating an additional 1-megawatt of reserve power in case of emergency.

PEDC currently operates Iloilo City’s 164-megawatt coal-fired power plant. It is a subsidiary of the Global Business Power Corp. (GBPC) under the Metrobank Group of Companies.