The long anticipated 40 megawatts of rental generation will be fully operational by the end of this week and are expected to alleviate power outages in New Providence, according to officials at Bahamas Power and Light (BPL).
During a tour of the Blue Hills Power Station on Thursday, officials showed the media the company's new Aggreko power plant which holds 38 containers each housing one rental unit of generation.
Each unit generates 1.1 megawatts of power, which means the plant can generate an estimated 41.8 megawatts.
BPL Corporate Communications Manager Arnette Ingraham said this is not only good news for the company, but good news for many Bahamians.
"This is a milestone for us," said Ingraham. "This is something that we've been working towards for some time - to have these additional 40 Aggreko units installed and online. We expect that by the end of this week, all 40 of those units will be up and running here at our Blue Hills Power Station.
"The good thing for us is that this, along with the existing 40 megawatts of Aggreko units that we've had for some time and our existing fleet, we hope that this will alleviate some of the outages our customers in New Providence have been experiencing for some time.
"... You see that the site is something that could not happen overnight. It was a long-term process. One of the people spoke to you and said that the site was bushes about 45 days ago.
"That is prepared. We had to get the engines here and get them installed. We had to get the cabling in and all the fuel lines and that is a lot of extensive work and we had to make sure that it was done safely and in the best interest of our employees and also for the community as well.
"... We hope that this means that the level of outages that our customers have been experiencing in New Providence will diminish significantly in the next couple of days."
The rental generation has been flown in from Australia, Denmark, Panama, Dubai and other countries.
Deputy General Manager of BPL Shevonn Cambridge said the rental generation now gives the company the opportunity to maintain older equipment.
"For the long term in terms of generation for BPL, we are coming toward the end of our summer peak season and we go into basically what is supposed to be our maintenance season for our permanent fleet," said Cambridge.
"This will allow us the availability to be able to take out some of our permanent plant and conduct the preventative maintenance exercise on those so we can be ready for next summer season. But in the interim, the rentals are going to be with us for the next 13-plus months, so they will also be around to assist with existing capacity coming into next summer."
Cambridge said the additional generation may also assist with lowering the fuel charge.
"The difference between the plants is there are different technologies and different fuels," he said. "Here at Blue Hills, we have the gas turbines which is one set of technology and the rental units are what we call medium speed diesels.
"At Clifton, we have slow speed diesels. Our slow speed diesels run on heavy fuel oil which is the cheaper of the fuel but here, we both use number two, ADO (automotive diesel oil) and the medium speed diesels that you would have seen on the rental site. They are actually more efficient than the gas turbines that we use.
"By bringing on the additional 40 megawatts of rental units, the medium speed, we are going to reduce our ADO consumption in terms of production for New Providence. That means it will assist with lowering the fuel charge you see on your bill."
Bahamas Electrical Workers Union (BEWU) President Paul Maynard last week warned that Bahamas Power and Light (BPL) is now "at the end of the line". He argued that the Blue Hills Power Station was not enough to supply the island without the additional 40 megawatts of power. The news follows a summer plagued with power outages. Many described it as "the worst summer ever" in regards to power outages.
Jayme C. Pinder, Guardian Staff Reporter
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