Pointing out that the Government nor the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) has not given any “acceptable explanations” or measures to avoid frequent power outages, the Opposition will be moving a motion in the National Assembly calling for a “long term strategy” to be unveiled. It is also being asked that the plan be a product of national consultation.
The motion to be tabled by PPP/C M.P, Bishop Juan Edghill states that “GPL is in recent times being plagued by frequent widespread and unscheduled power outages affecting production and productivity in all sectors.”
It also highlighted that the power company has benefitted from significant investments through loan agreements, grants from international developmental partners and injection of public funds for its expansion and development. Additionally, the imposition of Vat on an already unreliable supply of electricity “will only aggravate the frustrations people are experiencing and further disincentivise the productive and business sectors”.
“Be it resolved that the National Assembly calls on the government to inform the public and this house as to the causes of and measures it will be taking to ameliorate the frequent widespread and unscheduled power outages that the country is experiencing”.
It also calls on the company to abide by the procurement laws and ensure contracts are fairly and transparently awarded so that programmes for the sector can proceed with no further delays.
Following frequent blackouts over the last holiday period, even after several promises of reliable service, the power company said it will be conducting a protection coordination study to reduce its disruptions in the first quarter of 2017. It was noted that GPL will also begin transitioning to renewable energy.
Acting Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Renford Homer told media operatives that “What we see in 2017 going forward will really be a shift in GPL method of operation with a focus on just purely fossil generation to taking onboard generation coming from renewable sources to strengthening its network to offering what is more seen as a fault-tolerant network to introducing into the network a level of redundancy, particularly on the transmission lines.”
