The Philippines' Visayas grid was placed under red alert on August 7, as four major coal-fired power plants were still unavailable and electricity imports from Mindanao remained limited, according to the National Grid Corp. of the Philippines (NGCP).

A red alert, indicating supply is insufficient to meet demand and the grid's regulating requirement, was issued for 5 p.m. to 7 p.m., the NGCP said in an advisory.

Meanwhile, a yellow alert has also been declared from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. to 10 p.m., signaling an operating margin short of contingency requirements.

Available capacity in the Visayas grid was estimated at 2.36 GW against projected peak demand of 2.35 GW. The grid operator said units at Therma Visayas, Kepco SPC Power, Cebu Energy Development Corp and Toledo Power's coal-fired plant were still offline. Imports from Mindanao were constrained by an extended outage at Sarangani Energy's Unit 2 and a planned outage at STEAG State Power Plant's Unit 2.

Twelve power plants in the Visayas were on forced outage, with another 12 operating at derated capacities, removing a total of 1.12 GW from the grid. More than 20 other plants have been unavailable since 2021.

The alerts follow months of recurring supply strain in the region, where prolonged plant outages have threatened economic activity and industrial output.