The soaring cost of electricity has many Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) customers outraged. The angst and frustration of many of the callers into Love 97’s daily talk show “Issues of the Day” yesterday came from around the Bahamas.
“We’ve been having 50-year-old problems in this country. The Bahamian people have been saddled with this issue of electricity generation,” one caller said.
“For 50 years, a half of century, and now it has gotten to the point where it is unsustainable for Bahamians. My fuel charge for one month is $356.00,” he added.
“How can a monopoly be broke? How a monopoly can’t deliver good electricity service and reduce cost; a monopoly you don’t have any competition, but you’re malfunctioning so much,” said another caller.
“I really wish election used to be every two years, five years is too long sir,” he added.
One of the callers said his friend’s, who’s a business owner, electricity bill was as high as $10,000.
“Ten thousand dollars I see on the statement from BEC, $10,000, I say what you running? He said I had some generators and some stuff, some coolers and all that; but I never see my bill like this. He said I almost fall out in front of the woman.”
“I have been faced with a $1200 light bill that my husband is fully responsible for every end of the month,” said one caller.
“When I saw his face, it was in such disbelief. Our light bills are normally under $400, the look on his face tells me something was wrong. He said babes, look at this, I said look at what honey?” she said.
“He said this light bill is now $1200; our bills are zero balance people, something is wrong, I am hot like a pot.”
There were some, however, who said despite the electricity bill hike, at this point, it’s still manageable.
“Mine has gone up, but from $180 or so, and the wife told me it was $300 last time, and we were running air conditioning during the summer, so obviously that had something to do with it,” he said.
“But I’ve never had a $400 light bill, and if my light bill goes up to $800 then something has to be wrong.”
Some callers even gave suggestions on how BPL consumers can reduce their electricity costs moving forward.
“What I do is, I turn off the water heater at night. I put energy saving bulbs in, when I leave, I make sure all the fans and lights are off, and so I monitor my bill,” said one caller.
“Now I could be letting these things run, letting the AC run, and then complain about it after 12 months, or after a month, but I choose not to do that,” he added.
“But I’m seriously saying though, if somebody lives in an average home, and their light bill is $1200, they have every right to complain.
“If your light bill is $900, you have every right to complain, I’ve never seen such a light bill, that’s crazy.”
“One of the things I feel that we can imitate is California’s title 24, which is their energy policy, and in adopting a policy like that. A lot of times when these new homes, government buildings, new schools are being designed, we can start to incorporate occupancy centers, dimmer switches throughout the schools, classrooms, ministry buildings, in order to bring down the electricity,” said another caller.
“If you were to dim down a light by 10 per cent, it is very difficult for the human eye to even notice that; but your energy savings is being reduced significantly,” he said.
“Just swapping out a regular incandescent bulb for a compact fluorescent bulb of LED light is not a sufficient savings that we as Bahamians are looking for.”
Speaking to Rotarians this week, President of The Bahamas Electrical Workers Union, Paul Maynard, gave tips on how to save on electricity.