TESTING for leaks in the country's lone gas production facility offshore northwest Palawan started early morning yesterday, with operator Shell Petroleum Exploration Corp (Spex) expected to announce today whether the $20 billion production facility needs to be shut down.

Spex was expected to complete testing at the production platform last night as energy officials drew up contingency measures to address a prolonged shutdown.

Malampaya currently supplies fuel to three gas-powered generating plants which account for 50 percent of the Luzon's power requirement.

The National Power Corp. gave the assurance the Luzon grid has sufficient capacity to meet consumption of 6,600 to 8,000 megawatts (MW) during the dry season months ending in June.

It added that capacity yesterday was at 7,600 MW against peak demand in the morning of 6,300 MW, in the afternoon of 6,400 MW and 6,200 MW in the evening.

A check with Spex showed gas flow was not interrupted during the testing, enabling the 1,200 MW Ilijan plant and the combined 1,500 MW Santa Rita and San Lorenzo to stay on line.

NPC said it expected to have normal coal supply in the Sual Masinloc and Pagbilao plants by next week.

"Some of the shipments, like those for Sual and Pagbilao, have been delivered, while the others have already been confirmed or are still for confirmation," it said.

Sual can use only Chinese coal while Masinloc can use Chinese and Australian coal. Pagbilao can use only Indonesian coal. Calaca is designed for local Semirara coal.

NPC said the tight supply of coal, felt even in coal-producing countries like Australia, China, Indonesia and South Africa, will not adversely affect the operations of its coal-fired power plants.

"We have enough coal inventory in our plants, and in fact, in Calaca, our coal stocks exceed the forecast consumption of the plant," NPC said,

NPC said it was also maximizing the use of its non-coal generation facilities, particularly, the Angat hydroelectric, the Kalayaan pumped storage, and the Malaya 2 diesel power plants.

"Our other power plants - particularly those running on hydro and geothermal - will be available to ensure continuous power supply. The public can also count on the power plants that have already been privatized and are now being operated by their new owners (Pantabangan-Masiway, Magat, Ambuklao-Binga, and others) to provide their power requirements," NPC said.

Coal used to account for one-third of NPC's output because it is cheaper than fuel oil. But due to the tight coal supply, NPC has been shifting to indigenous fuel sources like hydro, geothermal and natural gas.

In 2007, coal accounted for the biggest share of NPC's generation mix at 31.37 percent. Geothermal came in second with a 24.98 percent share, followed by natural gas and hydro with 19.24 percent and 16.34 percent, respectively.

The generation mix as of March was 52 percent natural gas, 18 percent coal, 13 percent hydro, 12 percent geothermal and 5 percent oil.

The possible prolonged shutdown of Malampaya prompted the NPC to recommend to Energy Secretary Angelo Reyes that a government-private sector task force be activated.

Aside from scheduling rotating brownouts ("interruptible loads") and partial factory shutdowns ("voluntary load curtailment"), the task force will look into:

. The deferment of scheduled maintenance of other power plants and major transmission lines.

. The sufficiency of alternate fuels (coal and distillate) and fast-tracking of such fuels.

. The regulatory solutions to the additional costs as a result of higher fuel costs, that is, how to secure Energy Regulatory Commission approval for higher rates for power consumers.