Rainfall 2017

I thought I recently read of an annual inflation rate of 1.7% ... but so many prices seem to be jumping well over that figure. Perhaps it is because they calculate the inflation rate on goods and services which rarely increase in price. Over to you Mr W.

 

It looks like the current price increases for electricity are in large part connected to mismanagement from the past. Apparently the country needed a lot of investments in new electricity generation plants in the 90's and 00's and instead of paying for those at that time, the money to build them was borrowed. The (government owned) Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management Corp. PSALM (apparently a reference to doing things wrong with biblical proportions).
This year the government decided that rather than keep paying growing interest charges to the bankers, that debt needs to be paid down in 5 years. That's the explanation for a large part of the surcharge on our electric bill. It is quite cynical though, that past generation cost subsidies in the rates (the non paid-for new generation plants) are now suddenly charged to current customers in a short period (5 years is not the expected life of an electricity plant).
So, rather than being connected to general inflation, this increase is related to past and current mistakes in financial management.

 

Got to agree Davy! Noreco and /or the transmission company down here are a total waste of space. Before coming here in 2013 I had lived in Cebu for the previous eight years and can't recall ever having a power outage. Hopeless!

 

I don't want to add to the people who are complaining about Noreco. I see these problems as a great opportunity. There are so many ways to use solar energy and this Kwh increase plus the frequent brownouts should be a huge incentive for anyone who owns a house, or has a long term lease, to put some form of solar package to use.

Everyone has different needs and should do their own research but I am personally fascinated by the new solar gadgets on the market.

 

It would be interesting to hear from anyone who's already installed solar panels how much electricity they generated this week.
Or, maybe what I'm trying to say is that if you would strive to become independent from Noreco you'd need to use a lot of overkill in the installed capacity of the solar panels, and augment with big big batteries.
One problem is that yes the solar panels have become both more efficient and a lot cheaper in the past decennium, but affordable battery technology is still lagging. The other problem is that Noreco apparently is not willing to install meters that will run in the opposite direction when you produce more electricity than you need, instead (if you can get them to agree) they will install a second meter to measure your excess feedback and pay you half the price per kwh that they charge you.
However, like you I am still interested in putting up some solar panels on my roof sometime soon. No more total blackouts during the daytime and enough savings on the electricity bill to compensate the initial investment in a reasonable period is enough of an incentive already, even if I would skip the batteries.

 

Hey Dave/ Davy/ Dustin: There is ABSOLUTELY a solution. Don't live in the tropics <grin>.. Or we could get the old family oligarchs in Manila to invest in infrastructure in the provinces instead of property and bank accounts overseas..

As to Power: Use more solid poles like ones being installed these days, Design/build the grid to have more bypasses and fewer single lines so breaks can be bypassed. Start a program of re-organizing the 1890's Brooklyn look of the lines along the roads, although noreco guys blame the communications companies. This would improve the ability of the poles to withstand more of mother nature..

Also, 9 inches of rain in two days is quite a bit.. yeah, i know it happens a lot... Also, need to educate businesses to conserve electricity by cutting down the amount of air conditioning flowing out the open doors...

 

My idea (and I think Dave also generally) would be to have enough battery to make it through the night and enough solar to run the house and charge the batteries during an average day. I am not going to try and oversize to be totally off grid and selling the extra power back to NORECO at half price. Being a bit short occasionally and having a couple hundred peso electric bill if fine by me. Brownouts would be nearly totally irrelevant and if we went crazy cooking, using every appliance while running aircon the grid is there to back me up.

Even with my current one battery and inverter I have no idea how many times the power has been on and off today (I do know several for varying lengths of time) as my wifi, router, computer, tv, speakers, and fan all continue to run. my upgrade path will probably be adding batteries and a bigger inverter/charger/with MPPT solar controller and solar panels.

 

At our place, we plan on a similar system, not looking to "sell" power, we had an extra panel in the states for an electric car, then moved here before getting a car, not worth the effort, pg&e gave us peanuts for the excess power at "annual true-up".

1. Is the switch from grid to battery always automatic during a blackout ?? (it ain't a brown nuthin)...

2. Who did your install ??? We've started to talk to people and get recommendations.

3. What brand is your battery ??

salamat...