Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) is investigating the causes of this past weekend’s power outages which resulted in intermittent load shedding throughout New Providence.
Yesterday, BPL Director of Public Relations K. Quincy Parker confirmed information revealed earlier this week by Bahamas Electrical Workers Union (BEWU) President Paul Maynard that three of the corporation’s generation assets are down, which exacerbated the load shedding problem.
“The failure of these assets extended the periods of load shedding which we were forced to undertake. BPL management would like to thank the generation team for their continuing hard and brilliant work as they seek to return these assets to the grid,” Parker said.
He added that the three generators went out of service last Thursday and Friday.
On Monday, Maynard told The Bahama Journal that three BPL generators G5, G7 and G10 are down and represents a total of 60 megawatts.
Maynard said he understands that generator G10 should be back on by Thursday and G7 would be ready by the weekend.
However, the BEWU president added that G5 would be out for a month or two and stressed that load shedding will continue until December.
According to Parker, BPL would like to assure consumers that the corporation is vigorously pursuing every available course of action to address these obstacles.
“In particular the Rate Reduction Bond process, which will allow BPL to access a much-needed capital infusion at this critical time in our ongoing development,” he said.
“We take this moment to look forward to the completion of the 132 megawatt power plant at Station A before the end of the year. The ability of the new station to provide base load generation will allow us to address some of the issues mentioned earlier, and will help BPL provide stable, reliable electricity to our customers in a safe and more affordable manner.”
BPL also apologized for this past weekend’s power outages.
“We recognize the inconvenience such outages cause to our community and we are working diligently to address the issues raised by aging infrastructure and a transmission and distribution grid in need of an upgrade,” Parker said.
