The Tribune

By KEILE CAMPBELL

Tribune Staff Reporter

kcampbell@tribunemedia.net

ENERGY, Utilities and Aviation Minister JoBeth Coleby-Davis, who faced mounting criticism after assurances about BPL’s summer preparedness were followed by months of recurring outages, said she has learned not to give “too much assurances” as officials prepare a review of the utility’s performance for Cabinet.

The review will examine peak demand, problems at substations and capital works needed to strengthen the electricity network after a summer of widespread outages. Mrs Coleby-Davis did not give a completion date for the review or say whether the report would be made public.

“Well, guess what I learned from this summer,” she said during a tour of EA Energy’s approximately $90m hybrid power project in Abaco. “Don’t give too much assurances.”

The review will also consider how BPL can strengthen relationships with overseas utilities to obtain personnel, equipment and other assistance when necessary.

“September is usually our peak,” Mrs Coleby-Davis said. “So we’ll do that after we go through our peak, and we’ll have that information to Cabinet, and then more information will come out as BPL continues to build on what we learned.”

She said officials were assembling a transformational team to prepare a report on lessons from the summer after the electricity system passes its usual September peak.

Mrs Coleby-Davis spoke amid a difficult summer for BPL.

She has said that BPL, Bahamas Grid Company and the Davis administration had underestimated the impact of unusually high temperatures and “didn’t expect it to be as bad”. She said critical transmission and distribution upgrades had also been delayed by eight weeks following the murder of Pike Electrical employee Cody Castillo.

A lightning strike triggered an explosion at BPL’s Blue Hills Power Station in July, causing widespread outages across New Providence and renewing criticism of the administration’s handling of the electricity system.

New Providence later suffered an island-wide blackout on July 30 after an underground cable fault caused a transformer failure at Blue Hills. Further disruptions affected parts of New Providence, Grand Cay, Guana Cay and other Family Island communities during August.

Prime Minister Philip “Brave” Davis conceded in a national address earlier this month that he could not promise an immediate end to the outages. He said failed generation and network equipment would be returned to service or replaced over the coming months.

Mrs Coleby-Davis again acknowledged the effect of the disruptions on households and businesses during the Abaco event.

“I know that an apology isn’t enough,” she said, “but I want to assure every Bahamian that we are working to improve our energy security in both the short and long term.”

She repeated her previous explanation that unusual heat and infrastructure work had placed additional pressure on the electricity system.

Mrs Coleby-Davis said June would ordinarily experience about four days above 90 degrees but recorded approximately 18 such days this year.

She said BPL’s annual summer-readiness programme was based on historical system information, but this year’s conditions caused disruptions while foundational work was underway.

“This summer has been one of the most unusual summers globally,” Mrs Coleby-Davis said. “Every country has surpassed their peak, their system peak, from June of this year, about three or four times, we have seen in years prior that we prepare for.”

She also said increased development had placed pressure on infrastructure that had not been prepared for the country’s current rate of growth.

“Some of the challenges that we’ve seen on our system lately is because it’s a bittersweet,” Mrs Coleby-Davis said. “We have a lot of growth.”

She said projects were coming out of the ground in Abaco, Eleuthera and New Providence, but the electricity system had not previously been prepared for that level of expansion.