Meralco Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Manny V. Pangilinan expressed willingness to collaborate with the government regarding the directive of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to remove system loss charges from the electric bills of consumers.

However, he questioned who would shoulder the cost if the system loss charge is completely removed from the electricity bills.

System loss occurs when power travels through transmission lines, but it does not mean that operations are inefficient.

Pangilinan added that if the system losses are scrapped, power industry companies will be forced to shoulder the costs from generation, transmission, and distribution. For him, this is not a small matter as it could cost billions of pesos just in case they pay the charge.

Recently, the collection of system loss charges has been mandated by law. Several lawmakers aim to amend the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA) before the implementation of the complete removal of such charges from the consumer’s electric bills.

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