Caliraya Lake is man-made located to the south of Metro Manila and Rizal Province. It is popular for excursions or weekend getaways. There are many resorts of all sizes around and near the lake and another man-made body of water nearby, Lumot Lake. There are also many houses or cottages for rent around and in the lake. I say 'in' because there are places around and in the lake that are not accessible by land, and you would have to rent a boat to get there. Nowadays, it is easier to find and book a place with Airbnb and other apps at your disposal.
Last weekend’s getaway allowed me to take a few quick photos of a familiar sight that is the Kalayaan hydro-electric power plant located in the town of Lumban, Laguna at its border with Kalayaan town in the same province. Built in 1982, it was the first of its kind in Southeast Asia and is the only pumped storage plant in the Philippines. Basically, what ‘pumped storage’ means is that it can reverse its turbine to suck water from the basin at the level of Laguna de Bai to charge what could be a depleted Caliraya reservoir. It can then draw water from the lake to generate power. If water levels at the reservoir are normal to high such as during the wet season, it can draw water more than it needs to pump back into the lake.
Approach to the viewing bridge
Approaching the floodgates
There’s a viewing bridge like the one in La Mesa Dam and Angat Dam but it is closed to the general public. The barangay welcome marker is also located here.
The viewing bridge as seen from the road. It is closed to the public but people still stopover to take photos. One can monitor the water level from the tower at the end of the bridge.
One landmark near to the penstock for the Kalayaan plant is the welcome sign for Kalayaan town along the national road.
One of the Kalayaan power plant’s penstocks, a gigantic pipe connecting the Caliraya Lake to the plant at the level of Laguna de Bai
Another photo of the penstock, which is 6m in diameter and 1,300m long. This feeds into two turbines that generate power as water passes through them.
I wanted to write about the power plant as I recalled memories of a field trip we had in the area when I was a 5th year student in civil engineering back in 1992. We went to both Kalayaan and Caliraya power plants as part of our CE 112 class on Water Resources Engineering and we had a blast seeing the facilities back then. I also recall we had photos for posterity but my copies were also lost to the floods of 2009.
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