Guv seeks legal action vs. NPC
FOR VIOLATION OF PROTOCOL
LINGAYEN—Governor Amado T. Espino Jr. is angered by last week’s violation of the agreed protocol on the release of water from the San Roque Dam and is bent on taking legal action against those responsible.
In a press briefing held August 7 at the Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, the governor expressed dismay over the perennial issues over the dam’s water releases that cause undue alarm to the public of possible flashfloods every time there is a storm or heavy rains.
“Usapan noon na at 276 masl magbukas na sila para hindi na nila biglaang magbukas pag nandyan na ang malaking tubig,” Espino said.
But even when the water level at the dam already surpassed the agreed 280 masl spilling level, San Roque Power Corporation still waited for the go-signal from its lead agency National Power Corporation (NPC) before discharging waters in two gates. The gates were eventually opened at two meters with an outflow of 580.66 cubic meters per second (cms).
He said that the protocol was violated as the water already reached the dam’s 284 meters sea level (masl) a day before the media briefing.
“SRPC’s reason for accumulating 280 masl and above is to avoid flooding in the lowlands, but we don’t have floods in the lowlands in fact,” the provincial chief executive noted.
“The real reason behind it is their support for power generation maski hindi nila sabihin,” he said.
“This has been going on for three years. We are already on the 4th year, we cannot continue like this,” Espino said, vowing to seek legal arbitration to clarify what takes precedence in the protocol for releasing water.
The governor pointed out that one of the dangers of abrupt release and a huge volume of water from the dam is that a stretch of the Agno River from San Manuel towns has not been dredged thus a sudden release of water as it happened in 2009,can cause the river to overflow and may even breach the dikes which will endanger the lives of the people.
While there was no typhoon in the Philippine Area of Responsibility which could have spawned heavy downpour, Provincial Administrator Rafael Baraan noted that the increased intake of water being spilled by Ambuklao and Binga dams could accelerate the rise of water within the dam structure.
The dam was blamed for the massive flooding in Pangasinan in 2009 that submerged 38 towns and cities and destroyed around P4 billion worth of crops, fish, roads, bridges and dikes after the San Roque Dam operators opened all of the dam’s spillway gates when it was about to reach its full capacity.
The established protocol on water releases are as follows: when dam water reaches 276 masl with continuous rainfall; when water is at spilling level of 280 masl; when there is a typhoon in the area; and, when there is an inflow of 500 cubic meters per second, the same volume must be made in the outflow process.
The provincial government is scheduled to conduct a multi-sectoral onsite inspection and public hearing on August 13 at the SRPC. (with report from PIO)
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