Alliance for Change (AFC) Executive Member David Patterson has lambasted the government for what he termed “lack of foresight and strategic planning” as it relates to the frequency of power outages.
At his party’s press conference yesterday, the former minister of Public Works was adamant that the state should desist from blaming the David Granger administration for a situation that was over 30 years old.
He informed reporters that currently there is a shortfall in generating capacity of approximately 35 MW to 40 MW, as several units are down at the Kingston location, while the new plants at Garden of Eden are operating below their listed capacity – all because of poor maintenance practices.
“The Alliance for Change joins with the rest of the country in bemoaning the state of our power generation sector, this woeful situation is not unexpected. The AFC, via numerous public statements, predicted this national catastrophe since 2020. Sadly, the PPP government [was] too blind and arrogant to heed our warnings,” he said.
Patterson summarised that in 2015, the coalition government – A Partnership for National Unity and Alliance for Change (APNU+AFC) – inherited a dysfunctional power system that was in dire need of major capital and technical investments.
According to him, unlike the current government, his party did not seek to cast blame on its predecessors but rather set about repairing and upgrading the entire power-generating network.
“Our priority was to determine the challenges facing the sector, then we proceeded to develop short, medium and long-term strategies to improve the network. This required hiring new management staff (an internationally recruited CEO), technical training for the existing staff, procurement of additional generating capacity, upgrade and repairs to our poorly functioning transmission and distribution network. While we will readily admit that the sector was not perfect by 2020, it was, however, heading in the right direction,” he told the media.
“Despite the conflicting misinformation being peddled by the PPP, we procured over 60+MW of new generating power, upgraded over 1000 km of high and medium voltage lines, installed new transformers and boosted our protection network. These actions resulted in a more reliable electricity supply and a reduction in the frequency of blackouts.
“Notwithstanding the claims now being made by the PPP, the proof of the pie is in the eating. During no period under the coalition administration were blackouts so pronounced and frequent. This is an incontestable fact,” Patterson contended.
The media was apprised of a prepared comprehensive strategy to carry the sector forward, by the AFC member, including that the gas-to-energy project was birthed under the coalition. “Albeit at quarter the cost of the current Wales gas-to-shore project. Funding was secured for several renewable projects, most of which have either been severely mutilated or abandoned by the PPP administration. Projects for major upgrades to the transmission and distribution network were underway, sadly these have also been shelved by the PPP.
“While the coalition administration considered a gas-to-shore project of 200 MW (US$500 million), as being the major generating source in the short to medium term, we also understood that until the commissioning of such a plant, additional investments in power generation would have been required during the interim period,” according to Patterson.
After the procurement of the 46.5MW plants now operating at Garden of Eden, GPL launched a Request for Information for an additional 50 MW, these bids were to be returned by September 1, 2020. However, the government scrapped this process, he added.
“Based on GPL expansion plans, 100 MW of new power was needed for the period 2020 – 2022. At the end of that period, the proposed gas-to-shore project, as originally designed, would have been commissioned, thus incrementally injecting a further 200 MW into the system. Sadly, all these plans were scrapped by the PPP, which has placed all their eggs in a single basket, being the Wales gas-to-shore project, a project which on its current trajectory will not deliver on its project promises,” he told the press.
“It is important to note that all the new generating sets proposed to be procured were designed as modular dual-fueled units, in other words once natural gas was landed, these new sets in a matter of days, could have been switched over to natural gas, thus ensuring maximum value for our investment. The new Garden of Eden plants already have this capability. The PPP version was to mothball all our existing plants, thus making all earlier investments ‘sunk costs’.”
He elaborated that in January 2016, a new unit called Power Producer Distributors Inc (PPDI) was established. This company took over the operation and maintenance contract from Wartsila, which at the time was staffed entirely by Guyanese.
He noted that for the preceding three years before 2016, all the major overhauls were undertaken by the Guyanese staff.
The AFC member recalled that when Guyana first purchased Wartsila sets, that company was awarded the operation and maintenance (O&M) contract. Notably this was the very first time that the company executed a contract of that nature. In other countries, the Finnish company entered several other such O&M contracts and exported Guyanese technical staff to run these new contracts.
“In 2015, Wärtsilä was proposing US$20.51 per megawatt hour compared to the US$16.78 that PPDI charged. That is US$3.73 per megawatt hour or US$2.4 million savings annually on 650,000 megawatt hours per year for GPL,” Patterson said.
According to him, PPDI was able to provide and deliver performance guarantees (heat rate = fuel consumption, plant availability and lube oil consumption) superior to Wartsila, with a 98% operational rate (generation uptime). The company was able to achieve ISO certification within two years of formation signalling the quality with which it provided its services was world-class.
“These days, engines seldom can achieve maximum output even after returning from major overhauls. The running programmes for the restart of engines are not properly adhered to. The technical qualification system that was in place to develop employees is now dormant, so new employees lack a structured development programme, and spare parts are seldom readily available,” he lamented.
“GPL has more than 20 maintenance overhauls scheduled for 2024, some of which were deferred from last year. Unfortunately, due to the shortage of generating capacity, these maintenance programmes will have to be deferred since taking any of the generating sets offline will further increase the energy deficit. This was the same position that the coalition inherited in 2015, which was corrected but has now resurfaced with the return of the PPP.
“No amount of PR, untruths and misinformation will resolve our electricity woes, nor will it replace equipment destroyed by continuous voltage fluctuations. Families and businesses need the government to make improvements within a properly constructed plan and provide a stable, reliable service for customers, which is foundational to our country’s development.”
Patterson further added that his party was of the staunch belief that the PPP administration was clueless concerning the management of the country’s electricity sector.
He affirmed that the petulance, childishness and blame game demonstrated by the government would not counter the frequency of blackouts, only long-term plans can avert the issue.
