Davao Light is the third largest privately-owned electric distribution utility in the country in terms of customers and annual kilowatt-hour (kWh) sales. With a franchise covering Davao City and Davao del Norte areas of Panabo City and the Municipalities of Carmen, Dujali and Santo Tomas, Davao Light services a population of approximately 1,777,926 and a total area of 3,561 square kilometers. Davao Light has 404,574 customers as of December 2018, with 27 distribution substations and 2 sub-transmission substations strategically located throughout its franchise. On hot standby is its 63.4 MW Bunker C-fired standby plant with a rated capacity of 58.7 MW, but can provide an average of 40 MW on a sustaining basis. The standby plant is capable of supplying 8% of Davao Light's electricity requirement. As of December 2018, Davao Light hit a cumulative 2,298,361,482 kWh in energy sales posting a 10-year compounded annual growth rate of 5.75%. Meanwhile, peak demand was recorded at 404 MW higher than last year's 379 MW. One of Davao Light's approaches to keep rates at reasonable levels is by maintaining its systems losses well within the government mandated cap of 8.5%. The 12-month average system loss as of December 2017 is 7.32%.