By Lesroy W. Williams Observer Reporter
” (Basseterre, St. Kitts)-The power situation in St. Kitts, although not completely remedied, has improved significantly, but it will cost the government millions of dollars to put the electricity situation back on track. In giving an update on the power plant’s power generating capacity, Prime Minister Douglas said there still would be load shedding in order to give the engineers room to continue working on repairs. The fire reduced the power station’s available generating power capacity from 29.9 mw’s to 15.9 mw’s and this reduction in power is what led to load shedding, the Prime Minister said. At the Needsmust Power Plant there are nine generators that generate a total of 38.7 mw’s of power The Mirrlees 8MB 430 was repaired and generates a capacity of six megawatts; two Man Holeby Generators produce 3.9 mw’s each; Caterpillar # 1 Generator provides 2.5 mw’s; Caterpillar #2 is down; KV 12 #’s 1 and 2 produce 2.6 mw’s each and K 8 Generator provides 2.9 mw’s.”” The generator at La Valley is currently being prepared to be synchronized and will feed into the grid with an additional capacity of 2.5 mw’s, the Prime Minister said. This will bring the total capacity of megawatts to 20.9, which is still short of the 24.1 megawatts needed to satisfy peak demand. Leader of the People’s Action Movement (PAM), Lindsay Grant, in a statement after the electricity disaster said “I have said for years over and over that a generator sits down at La Valley corroding away with constant sea blast, paid for by taxpayers of this country while we suffer from an unreliable supply of electricity for years.” “We are determined to return to a state of normalcy as quickly as possible. We give that assurance that within a period of six months we would have the seven megawatts generator fully back on stream to supply the necessary electricity that is required,” Dr. Douglas said. “In the meantime therefore, we have mobilized to lease some power. Cabinet gave full support to the Ministry last week when it came with a comparative proposal from two companies and as a result of that we have given the okay for the Ministry to proceed to engage one of them and I understand that today (Oct. 21) those two generators which we have leased are on the waters and they should be arriving today (Oct. 21) and we should have the excess that we need to take us through the tourist season, the Christmas Season and we would have the extra for our peak demand and also the extra that is required to do maintenance while at the same time responding to our peak demand,” Dr. Douglas said. The Prime Minister said that it will cost over $2 million to rent the generators. “When you look at the human cost that also will be utilized apart from the rental of the hardware, we can see ourselves utilizing well over $5 million US to ensure that we can successfully provide our customers with the additional energy and power supply to keep us comfortable and safe here in St. Kitts and Nevis,” Dr. Douglas said. He thanked all those who have really understood the situation and who have been inconvenienced by the load shedding especially those who have lost food due to spoilage. “I want you to understand that this is a matter beyond our control and ask that you understand that we would be returning to a state of normalcy in days if not hours,” Dr. Douglas said.
