Power ship dispatched to alleviate Guyana's blackouts

An emergency power ship is set to leave Cuba today for Guyana to be integrated into the country’s electricity grid to bring some reprieve to citizens faced by a series of blackouts.

Minister within the Ministry of Public Works, Deodat Indar, told attendees at the Local Content Summit that the ship should take about 15 days to get to Guyana and it will inject approximately 36 megawatts of electricity into the national grid.

The power ship will be integrated into the Demerara Berbice Interconnected System (DBIS) for 24 months, Indar said.

The minister said Guyana Power and Light Company (GPL) is building the infrastructure necessary to accommodate the connection of this vessel to the national grid.

“So, the blackout is a temporary thing. It will be fixed. And there is a plan to deal with it, in the immediate term to address the shortage of generation capacity, so that we can bridge until the gas to energy comes with the 300 megawatts. It will take it to a total of 500 plus megawatts,” Indar stated.

The power ship will work together with 17 generators and six step-up transformers that the government recently acquired to produce another 30 megawatts for the grid.

The new Gas to Shore project at Wales is set to commence operations next year and it will allow Guyana to use its natural gas deposits for power generation.

Meanwhile, President Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali said he believes the ship’s temporary addition to Guyana’s power grid is a worthwhile investment.

When pressed by reporters about its cost to taxpayers, Ali said Guyana needed to build its capacity to meet the demands of the growing economy.

“You want blackouts?” Ali asked.

There are a number of problems [with the power grid] one of which is capacity. The exponential growth and the lack of capacity. How do you get capacity? You have to buy capacity. You can’t wish that capacity will come and that the problem will be solved,” Ali said.

Ali said Guyana’s power grid is heavy burdened because of the previous administration not investing in new infrastructure to meet the demand.

The president said his government will be pressing forward with plans to resuscitate the Amaila Falls Hydropower Project.

The government is presently evaluating proposals for the dam’s construction, transmission lines from Amaila to Linden, and sub-stations at the Amaila site.