JUAN MCCARTNEY ON THE TRUTH ABOUT THE FNM & BPL

10 August 2019 from Facebook

Juan McCartney FB post on  BPL in response to Lea trying to exonerate the FNM  – “This post is incorrect and a little intellectually lazy.

This administration spent almost the entire first year trying to fire PowerSecure and did so.

This administration amended the Electricity Act to lock in the tariff structure and further block oversight of BPL by URCA.

Under this administration the board arranged for $100 million in funding for capital upgrades that were critical to New Providence and the Family Islands.

We don’t know where that money came from. But we have been told that money was used for a non transparent deal with Wartsila and BWSC which we still don’t know the details of.

Then under this administration, a three-storey tall generator was brought back online with no safety protocols in place resulting in a fire that destroyed two major generators at Clifton.

I believe it cost us at least 30 megawatts of generation capacity.

After nearly a year, the minister and this board has refused to release the findings of the investigation into why that fire was started and what it will ultimately cost.

The money for capital upgrades also would have went into maintenance at Blue Hills, but it hasn’t, hence why those generators keep failing.

The chief engineer of the Clifton plant, Errol Davis, was sent home under this administration, which begs the question as to who is running Clifton.

The former chief operating officer resigned amidst all this. BPL has yet to explain why.

Further, senior people at BPL we’re given VSEPs in an exercise that cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars. Many of them have been called back to work.

This administration knew summer was coming but did not order enough rental generation.

This administration has failed on BPL on much more than this and the minister refuses to acknowledge the depth of the crisis or that this is even a crisis.

There has been scarcely any accountability regarding BPL.

Further, the new generation plant will not ultimately solve this.

BPL’s transmission and distribution infrastructure is outdated and will eventually fail.

Bannister did not even speak to BPL in his budget presentation.

We have no idea what the future holds expect for a promise to wait for a generation plant, being built and run by who knows how many foreigners, that is as we speak out of step with where energy generation is going”.