The House of Representatives on Tuesday opened a congressional inquiry into the massive May 13 power outages that affected millions of consumers in Luzon and the Visayas, as lawmakers pressed for accountability and stronger safeguards against future grid failures.
The joint investigation by the House Committee on Energy and the House Committee on Legislative Franchises stemmed from a resolution filed by Speaker Faustino “Bojie” Dy III and Senior Deputy Speaker Ferdinand “Dinand” Hernandez.
The inquiry focused on the cascading tripping of the Tayabas-Ilijan and Dasmariñas-Ilijan 500-kilovolt transmission lines, which triggered Red and Yellow alerts across the Luzon and Visayas grids.
In an opening statement, the hearing was meant to produce clear answers for consumers affected by the widespread disruption.
“This resolution, authored by Speaker Bojie Dy III and myself, is a call to action. Filipinos affected by these outages expect today’s discussion to be productive, transparent, and collaborative as we work together to strengthen our energy infrastructure and ensure a reliable power supply for every Filipino,” Hernandez said.
He said the inquiry should go beyond identifying technical failures and should instead determine what systems broke down, why they failed, and what measures must be adopted to prevent a similar incident.
“This inquiry should remain constructive, solution-oriented, and responsive to the concerns of the public. Our mandate today is to determine what failed, why it failed, and what measures must be put in place to prevent similar incidents from happening again,” he said.
More than 3.9 million consumers across Metro Manila, Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, and Rizal were affected by Manual Load Dropping during the outage.
He warned that repeated transmission failures have serious economic consequences, especially as households and businesses continue to face inflation and rising costs.
“Every time the lights go out, businesses incur losses, households are disrupted, and our economy, already grappling with inflation and global volatility, takes another avoidable hit,” he said.
The House leader also stressed the need for stronger coordination among the Department of Energy, the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines, regulators, and industry players to improve response time and crisis management during major power disruptions.
“When these failures occur, the public rightfully demands accountability from government. That is why we must move beyond reactive responses and work toward a more proactive and resilient energy system,” Hernandez said.
He said the DOE must have real-time visibility and timely coordination with the grid operator to ensure faster response, clearer communication, and better crisis management.
According to Hernandez, the inquiry will focus on technical accountability and grid resilience, coordination and communication protocols, supply security, and ancillary services.
He emphasized that power system stability depends on the coordinated action of regulators, system operators, and power producers.
“No entity operates in a vacuum. The regulator, the system operator, and the power producers are all interconnected stakeholders in maintaining the stability of our power system,” the solon said.
“Our goal today is to bridge operational gaps, strengthen coordination, and establish safeguards that will better protect the grid and the Filipino people,” he added.