Filipinos under "Energy Emergency": Rising Electricity Bills, Reduced Travel, Business Expansion Delays

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The morning calm was shattered by sudden noise. In his home in Manila, Philippines, Wang Xiaojun had not fully woken up when slogans began echoing from downstairs—dozens of jeepney drivers gathered on the street, protesting the more than doubling of diesel prices while calling for the U.S. to stop its wars in the Middle East.

Philippine jeepney drivers protested rising fuel prices at a gas station on March 26. Source: Respondent provided

As the fourth week of turmoil in the Middle East triggered by U.S. and Israeli attacks on Iran unfolds, its spillover effects are rapidly transmitting to the Asian energy market.

For a long time, Asia has been highly dependent on Middle Eastern oil and gas. Before the current restrictions on transportation through the Strait of Hormuz, approximately 90% of the oil and 83% of the liquefied natural gas exported through this strait went to Asia. Now, with this vital energy corridor blocked, many Asian countries are forced to activate emergency mechanisms, with some even reverting to coal to fill the oil and gas gap and maintain electricity supply and transportation.

Among them, the Philippines, which relies on the Gulf region for 98% of its oil imports, was the first to sound the alarm. Since the outbreak of the U.S.-Israel-Iran conflict on February 28, diesel and gasoline prices in the country have more than doubled, leading to the announcement of a “national energy emergency” on March 24. On March 26, the Philippine energy market regulatory authority stated that due to the fuel supply risks and severe price fluctuations caused by the Middle Eastern conflict, it has suspended the wholesale electricity spot market (WESM) across all three grids, with a restoration time to be announced later. This is the latest emergency measure taken by the government to address the energy supply risks and price volatility caused by the ongoing geopolitical conflict in the Middle East.

Yang Mu Yi, a senior analyst at energy think tank Ember, told The Paper (www.thepaper.cn) in an interview that this crisis has deeply exposed the structural dependency of Southeast Asia’s development model on imported fossil fuels. In the short term, countries may be able to juggle between coal and natural gas to alleviate urgent energy and economic pressures, but in the long run, the key lies not in choosing which fossil fuel to rely on, but in whether they can break free from their dependency on fossil fuels altogether. Only by developing clean electricity, promoting end-use electrification, nurturing green industries and fuels, and reshaping the foundations of their energy and economic systems can Southeast Asian countries truly escape this predicament.

Energy crisis significantly impacts ordinary people

According to China News Service, Philippine President Marcos signed Executive Order No. 110 on the evening of March 24, declaring a national energy emergency due to the impact of the Middle Eastern conflict. Marcos stated that this decision was made because “the availability and stability of the national energy supply face an imminent threat.”

According to The Guardian, the initial duration of the state of emergency is set for one year.

In a televised address, Marcos announced that the government will procure one million barrels of oil to replenish existing stocks, which currently can only last for 45 days. “Anything is possible. We are considering all possible options, any suggestions, any ideas,” said Marcos.

Philippine Ambassador to the U.S. Romualdez had previously told Reuters that Manila is working with Washington to seek exemptions to import oil from countries under U.S. sanctions.

However, macro-level risks have already translated into real pressure on ordinary household bills.

Wang Xiaojun provided the electricity bill for March, which shows a noticeable increase in electricity prices compared to the same period last year.

Wang Xiaojun, the Executive Director of Climate Action Network (Philippines), told The Paper that he just received this month’s electricity bill: in March this year, the power consumption was exactly 62 kilowatt-hours, the same as the same period last year, but the electricity cost has risen from 779 pesos (about RMB 89.5) to 840 pesos (about RMB 96.5). With the Easter holiday approaching next week, he expects the number of Filipinos returning home this year may significantly decrease, as diesel and gasoline prices have risen sharply since early March, and there may be supply shortages in the future.

“The national energy emergency translates to higher electricity bills and more inconvenient travel for ordinary people,” Wang Xiaojun said.

This sentiment can be found among Filipinos in different regions and professions.

38-year-old Alfredo Orencia, a principal at a primary school in Nueva Ecija Province, has limited income. He feels most powerless about the continuous rise in electricity prices, which further compresses an already tight family budget. “The pressure is not just economic, but also emotional,” he told The Paper.

36-year-old housewife Marjorie Montalban-Borreo, living in an apartment in Pasig City, views this crisis as a process of “being forced to shrink her lifestyle.” She told The Paper that she spends most of her time at home, so the most direct change comes from the electricity bill—even though her family’s electricity consumption has not significantly increased, the expenses continue to rise.

Her husband works at a bank, and the rise in gasoline prices has also increased the family’s commuting costs. To cope with the pressure, the family has started to minimize outings, keeping their activities close to their neighborhood; at home, they consciously stagger the use of appliances to avoid running multiple high-energy devices simultaneously.

The crisis is also affecting small and medium-sized enterprises. 35-year-old Jose Dominic Tolentino from Quezon Province runs a printing shop. Having set aside some financial buffer beforehand, the impact of this crisis on his personal living standards has not yet fully manifested, but he has started to proactively cut unnecessary expenses, minimizing dining out and travel.

He told The Paper that what truly alerts him are the cascading effects in operations: utility costs, logistics costs, and raw material prices are all under upward pressure. To cope, he has had to purchase materials in advance, encourage clients to sign contracts early to lock in prices, and schedule some work for nighttime to reduce air conditioning use. Additionally, he has delayed expansion plans to preserve cash flow as much as possible.

From their accounts, the so-called “energy crisis” in the Philippines is no longer just about abstract indicators like import dependency, inventory days, and international oil prices; it is tangibly changing the lives of ordinary people.

Short-term self-rescue by “returning to coal”

Just hours before announcing the energy emergency, Philippine Energy Secretary Sharon Garin stated that due to severe disruptions in natural gas transportation caused by the war, the Philippines plans to increase the electricity generation from coal-fired power plants to lower electricity prices and alleviate supply pressures. This measure is expected to be implemented as early as April 1.

The Philippine government also announced that it has started distributing subsidies of 5,000 pesos (about RMB 573) to motorcycle taxi drivers and other public transport workers nationwide, while some cities are providing free public transport services for students and workers.

As an archipelago nation with a population of 116 million, the Philippines is already one of the countries with the highest energy costs in Southeast Asia, relying on imported fuel to maintain its power generation system. Currently, about 60% of the country’s electricity comes from imported coal.

“This short-term ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ approach means that after experiencing an oil and gas ‘strangulation,’ the Philippines may face the risk of coal ‘strangulation’ in the future, remaining long-term trapped in dependency on fossil fuels,” Wang Xiaojun said.

This judgment is not alarmist. As the world’s largest coal exporter, the Philippines’ neighbor Indonesia typically prioritizes domestic demand over export markets. This arrangement further exacerbates the vulnerability of import-dependent countries and may drive up regional and even global coal prices.

In this regard, Singapore’s Foreign Minister Vivian recently warned in an interview with Reuters that the closure of the Strait of Hormuz could trigger an “Asian crisis.”

“Asian countries have long relied on Middle Eastern energy, a weakness that has long been known, but has never been subjected to such severe tests as it is now,” Vivian said. If the conflict escalates into retaliatory damage to energy facilities, it will not only lead to severe fluctuations in oil and gas prices but also trigger overall inflation. The Philippines’ situation is just a microcosm of Asia.

In fact, several Asian countries have been forced to increase coal use again to respond to the shortages of liquefied natural gas and electricity supply pressures.

According to The Independent, India is increasing its coal consumption to meet the upcoming summer peak electricity demand; South Korea has relaxed restrictions on coal power; Indonesia, a major coal-producing country in Southeast Asia, has stated it will prioritize domestic coal supply; Thailand, the Philippines, and Vietnam are also increasing coal power generation. The price of Newcastle coal, a major import reference for Asia, has risen by 13% since the outbreak of the war.

However, increasing coal use does not necessarily mean lower electricity prices and more stable supplies. E3G expert Russell Marsh pointed out that coal prices are also affected by global markets, and importing countries remain exposed to price fluctuations and supply disruptions.

Transformation dilemma: Unsustainable, yet hard to replace immediately

The reason coal is being reconsidered as an “insurance option” lies in its relative availability in some countries and its seeming ease in alleviating the pressures caused by rising electricity prices and supply fluctuations in the short term.

But the problem is precisely that the more fossil fuels are “emergency escalated” in times of crisis, the easier it is to lock society back into existing paths. Time magazine’s analysis noted that this crisis has stimulated the willingness of fossil-free countries to develop wind and solar energy to some extent, but it has also given fossil energy nations a reason to continue expanding extraction investments.

Orencia does not deny the practical necessity of fossil fuels. In his view, most areas of daily life, such as transportation and electricity, still depend on fossil energy, making its importance irreplaceable in the short term. However, he also understands that this dependency is not sustainable in the long run: beyond price fluctuations, pollution and climate change continue to accumulate costs.

In contrast, solar and wind energy are clearly cleaner and more likely to become the future direction. However, for families like his with limited income, high installation costs and insufficient infrastructure make renewable energy seem distant. Therefore, he supports a gradual transformation backed by policies—where the government improves, through subsidies and public services, to lower the entry threshold for ordinary people into this system.

This is also a common sentiment among many ordinary Filipinos: supporting the transformation, but more concerned about the practical barriers.

Montalban-Borreo admitted that she previously did not know much about fossil fuels and renewable energy, primarily being able to mention solar panels. However, after the crisis occurred, she strongly realized that the energy structure is not an abstract concept but is directly related to monthly electricity bills, family travel, and life resilience.

She envies families that have already installed solar systems but, living in an apartment, is unsure if she has the same conditions. She hopes that in the future, apartment and commercial building managers can consider introducing solar facilities, and cities can build more electric vehicle charging stations; meanwhile, local governments and communities should strengthen public education efforts to ensure ordinary people at least know where to learn about and understand these new technologies.

Tolentino, on the other hand, represents a more cautious voice. As a business operator, he believes that fossil energy will eventually exit the historical stage, but he remains reserved about whether renewable energy is already ready to independently bear the responsibilities of real economic operation. Solar and wind energy have promising prospects, and costs are decreasing, but concerns about energy storage, stability, and whether they can continuously meet demand without raising overall costs remain at the forefront of his mind. Energy transformation must be not only “cleaner” but also “affordable and reliable.”

Yang Mu Yi believes that rebooting coal in the short term may help some countries “stop the bleeding,” but in the long run, such emergency choices may weaken the motivation for transformation and accumulate new risks.

“This does not mean that Southeast Asian countries are systematically turning back to coal. Because replacing natural gas power generation with coal, whether through new coal power projects or retrofitting existing units, requires a long cycle and faces multiple restrictions such as technical feasibility, financing conditions, and policy environment, making large-scale implementation difficult in the short term. In addition, as coal prices are also rising, the cost advantage and stability of coal as an ‘insurance option’ are also somewhat diminished,” he said.

In Wang Xiaojun’s view, the reality in the Philippines illustrates that the so-called “energy emergency” is, to some extent, a misinterpreted concept.

“The current crisis is actually misleading; accurately speaking, it should be called a ‘fossil fuel emergency,’” Wang Xiaojun emphasized. The issue is not that the Philippines lacks energy, but that societal cognition has long mistakenly equated “electricity” with “oil, gas, and coal.”

In fact, the Philippines is one of the countries in Southeast Asia with the best renewable energy resource endowment, boasting abundant sunlight, wind energy, and geothermal resources. In Wang Xiaojun’s view, this crisis should serve as a wake-up call, prompting the government to plan early and allow distributed solar photovoltaics and other renewable energies to enter more rural areas and communities.

Distributed solar photovoltaic panels installed by locals in the Philippines.

The practical barriers are primarily cost and financing. Wang Xiaojun cited an example: a friend of his installed a three-kilowatt home photovoltaic system last year for about 149,000 pesos (about RMB 17,000), nearly twice as expensive as installation in China, and it had to be paid in full upfront. For an average Filipino household earning only 20,000 pesos a month, such an upfront investment is extremely high. Equipment import costs, tariffs, and installation labor costs collectively drive up prices.

Even so, this system still has certain economic viability. Given the high electricity prices in the Philippines, the installer’s previous monthly electricity bill was about 4,000 to 5,000 pesos, and the installation would pay off in about four years. More importantly, in the reality of frequent power outages in the Philippines, especially in rural areas, photovoltaics can also enhance household electricity resilience. “After the typhoons in October and November last year, the village where he lived lost power, but his house still had electricity, and surrounding villagers came to his house to charge their phones,” Wang Xiaojun said.

In Wang Xiaojun’s view, the fuel shortage has also opened a door for electric vehicles to enter the Philippine market. If the government can accelerate the deployment of electric school buses and electric public transport vehicles, more people will directly feel that energy is not entirely synonymous with oil, gas, and coal, and that the transportation system does not have to be inherently dependent on fossil fuels.

“If people can experience that even without oil, the impact on life can still be partially controlled, rather than suddenly spiraling out of control, then society’s understanding of energy transformation will be entirely different,” he said.

The Paper reporter Liu Dong