Gov’t to discuss power cuts with Mirant this week
PHILLIP Paulwell, the energy minister, says discussions scheduled to begin this week between the government and Mirant Corporation will look at modifying the existing Jamaica Public Service (JPS) licensing agreement to ensure against islandwide power cuts.
Paulwell, who was responding to questions from Opposition Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) spokesman on energy Clive Mullings, said that the government was very concerned about the number of power cuts occurring currently, as well as the assessment of the July 15 islandwide power cut, and had written Mirant, the US firm which owns 80 per cent shares in the JPS, on the matter.
The minister said that a 25 per cent reserve margin had been achieved in terms of the JPS power generating capacity earlier this year, with a new unit coming on stream at Old Harbour. However, he said that the JPS had indicated that the current outages were due to the fact that after taking out the B-6 unit at Old Harbour for scheduled maintenance, two other generating units failed.
“We indicated to them that this is unacceptable and that we expect them to return to the 25 per cent reserve margin as soon as possible,” Paulwell told the House of Representatives.
He said that the issue should impact on talks he is scheduled to have with representatives of Mirant later this week.
In the meantime, Paulwell admitted that only minimal discussions have been held with Mirant to date on the US firm’s announced plans to sell its 80 per cent stake in the JPS. He said that talks between the government and Mirant since the announcement have concentrated mainly on the July 15 islandwide powercut. But the minister said that both the islandwide power cut and the current unscheduled outages should impact on the discussions this week with Mirant.