Published On:Tuesday, April 13, 2010

By CHESTER ROBARDS

Business Reporter

crobards@tribunemedia.net

BOTH BEC and the BEST Commission were responsible for vetting KES Environmental Services, the company that penned the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the Wilson City Power Plant, BEST's Director told Tribune Business yesterday. Tribune Business revealed yesterday that one of the EIA's authors signed under an erroneous designate.

Philip Weech, Director of the Bahamas Environmental Science and Technology (BEST) Commission, said the Bahamas Electricity Corporation (BEC) was responsible for finding the company to conduct the EIA for the new Wilson City, Abaco powerplant and that it was his department's responsibility to ensure that the company was viable and competent.

However, BEC told Tribune Business that it was the BEST commission's call on which the company would be used.

"BEC would do its own review of the EIA persons and they would select who they feel are capable," said Mr Weech. "BEC then wrote to us and provided us with details of the company they selected to undertake the EIA."

Mr Weech insisted that BEC was responsible for choosing the company they felt had the know-how and best price to do a study on the site where the new Abaco power plant was to be built. And the BEST commission simply reviewed the details of the company to ensure that it had the qualifications deemed necessary to complete the work.

However, it was discovered recently that one of the lead signatories on the EIA wrongfully used the professional designate "Environmental Engineer" on the document.

KES Environmental Services' employee, Crystal Robbins, who reviewed the EIA and conducted studies on the ground at the proposed site of the power plant, was found to be using the protected title under Florida law and should have signed the document as an "Environmental Consultant".

According to the Florida Board of Professional Engineers (FBPE), Ms Robbins would only be eligible to use the title Environmental Engineer if she was a licensed professional engineer in the State of Florida.

However, because she has no professional designation with the FBPE, KES was issued a cease and desist order barring them from using the designate "Environmental Engineer" when referring to Crystal Robbins.

Investigator for the FBPE, Wendy Gregory, told Tribune Business yesterday that KES signed an affidavit advising that they would "no longer use the protected title when referring to Ms Robbins."

Complaint

The citizen group, Responsible Development for Abaco (RDA), filed a complaint against KES after they discovered Ms Robbins' title might be incorrect.

RDA has railed against the powerplant, claiming the government did not do its due diligence in choosing the site for the building, being transparent with the Abaco community and in choosing a company to conduct the EIA. They also protested the proposed use of the Heavy Fuel Oil Bunker C. BEC has decided instead to use Automotive Diesel to run their generators. Mr Weech said despite the objections by the RDA the "project is sorely needed and the situation (with reliable power) will get worse in the summer months." However, he added that dialogue on any such matters are important.

According to him, much of the complaints in the local media have been overly inflammatory and misleading.

"Nothing will change that fact that the plant is 80 per cent complete," he said.