The Republic act No.11552 entitled “AN ACT EXTENDING AND ENHANCING THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE LIFELINE RATE, AMENDING FOR THE PURPOSE SECTION 73 OF REPUBLIC ACT NO. 9136, OTHERWISE KNOWN AS THE ELECTRIC POWER INDUSTRY REFORM ACT OF 2001, AS AMENDED BY REPUBLIC ACT NO. 10150” dated 28 October 2022. As mandated by law, the ERC, DOE and DSWD, in consultation with the Philippines Statistics Authority (PSA) and other public and private stakeholders, with the approval of the Joint Congressional Energy Commission (JCPC), shall issue, adopt and promulgate the rules and regulations to implement the provisions of RA No. 11552. Under Section 1 of RA No. 11552, further amending Section 73 of the EPIRA, as amended by RA No. 10150, the period of twenty (20) years was further extended to fifty (50) years. This means that the country’s marginalized electricity end-users will continue to benefit from the subsidy provided under the lifeline program. Based on ERC records, for the first semester of this year, the lifeline program provided an average monthly subsidy of PhP541 Million to almost six million marginalized electricity end-users in the entire country. The actual discounts to end-users will depend on the lifeline program per Distribution Utility (DU) approved by the ERC.