The Tribune

By JADE RUSSELL


Tribune Staff Reporter


jrussell@tribunemedia.net

Bahamas Grid Company chief executive officer Dareo McKenzie yesterday said of the recent spate of power outages: “Sometimes it may not be a bad thing.”

“I go out and sit on the beach and enjoy what this beautiful island has to offer. But to each his own, and it does not override our sacred responsibility to the consumers, which is to provide safe, reliable, and resilient service.”

His comments came at an Office of the Prime Minister press conference yesterday.

Bahamas Power and Light chief operating officer Anthony Christie said BPL cannot guarantee fewer outages in the coming weeks as above-normal temperatures place greater strain on its ageing system.

Even as the utility maintains it was prepared for the summer, officials urged consumers to reduce their electricity use.

He said August and September are expected to bring even hotter conditions and higher demand, preventing him from assuring frustrated consumers that the frequency of outages will decline.

New Providence has suffered weeks of widespread power cuts, with some residents reporting that they were without electricity for days.

At yesterday's press conference, BPL and Bahamas Grid Company officials attributed the outages to unusually high temperatures, ageing infrastructure, damaged equipment, unauthorised connections and increased demand driven by greater use of air conditioning.

A representative of the Department of Meteorology said The Bahamas has experienced above-normal temperatures during the past two to three months and that August and September are also expected to be hotter than usual.

Mr Christie said BPL plans annually for peak summer demand but did not anticipate temperatures and electricity consumption reaching their present levels.

“Based on abnormal conditions, we’re seeing higher loads, higher temperatures and more frequent failures on equipment,” he said. “So that’s now straining a lot of our resources that we did not really anticipate would be needed at this level.”

Pressed on whether the utility had been unprepared, Mr Christie rejected that characterisation and said BPL was confronting unforeseen conditions.

He said crews are working to strengthen the grid, shorten outages and reduce their impact, but warned that uninterrupted service cannot be guaranteed.

“They don’t want the light to never go off, but that’s not reality,” he said. “The light will go off. The power will go off. There will be an issue, a challenge that has to be addressed. But again, we’re trying to shorten the outages and lessen the impact.”

BPL executive chairman Christina Alston also defended the utility’s summer preparations, arguing that no mechanical or electrical system operates without interruption.

“Saying that the system is going to be on 100 percent of the time, that is a very unrealistic goal,” she said. “No system is 100 percent, 100 percent of the time. Your car doesn’t work 100 percent, 100 percent of the time.

“Nothing mechanical or electrical works 100 percent, 100 percent of the time. But what we have done is systematically gone through and mitigated where we could see problems occurring.”

Ms Alston described The Bahamas’ electricity network as one of the most complex in the Caribbean and urged homeowners to give BPL some “breathing room” by conserving energy during the remaining summer months.

At yesterday's press conference, Mr McKenzie stressed that officials were not asking residents to stop using air conditioning or abandon household comforts.

“We’re not saying do without,” he said. “We’re not saying do without your air condition or the luxuries of your home, enjoy that. All we’re saying is conserve — very different.”

Mr McKenzie said New Providence experiences two daily peaks in electricity demand, leaving the system with little relief.

Referring to the outages, he said: “Sometimes it may be not a bad thing. I go out and sit on the beach and enjoy what this beautiful island has to offer. But to each his own, and it does not override our sacred responsibility to the consumers, which is to provide safe, reliable, and resilient service.”

BPL recently asked government agencies to reduce electricity consumption, particularly by limiting air-conditioning use in public buildings. Ms Alston said that initiative had helped the utility reconnect more residential consumers and small businesses.

The Davis administration has made energy reform a central priority, pursuing power purchase agreements and transferring New Providence’s transmission and distribution network to BGC for upgrading and maintenance.

When the transfer was announced, the government said Island Grid Solutions, a Bahamian subsidiary of Pike Corporation, was the majority shareholder in BGC. Pike has since withdrawn from the arrangement.

Mr McKenzie said BGC also faces difficulty recruiting and retaining skilled workers. He said the company has recruited from the Bahamas Technical and Vocational Institute, advertised vacancies and hired experienced former BPL employees, including retirees.

BGC currently has between 60 and 80 line workers, he said.

Correction: In the printed version of this story, comments referring to going to the beach during outages were incorrectly attributed to Bahamas Power and Light chief operating officer Anthony Christie. The comments were made by Bahamas Grid Company chief executive officer Dareo McKenzie. We regret the error and apologise to our readers.