NORMALCY RESTORED AT VINLEC

A state of normalcy has returned to operations at the St. Vincent Electricity Services Ltd., after a week of load-shedding at one of its main power plants.

Chief Executive Officer, Thornley Myers assured Searchlight on Wednesday that round-the-clock work was done to restore electricity production at the company to normal levels.{{more}}

Last week, sections of the country were plunged into darkness after a major generator breakdown at the Cane Hall power plant left hundreds of Vincentians without electricity supply.

But, Vinlec, it seems, may now have the matter under control.

According to Myers, continuous work on failed engines at the power plant has now rectified the problem, and a turbocharger for a 4.2-mega watt generator, which was the immediate cause of the load shedding, was installed and back in operation by Wednesday.

“The No.9 engine, which was operating at half capacity is now back to full capacity and the No.11 engine pushing 4.2 mega watts, which had crashed was back up and running,” Myers told Searchlight.

According to the CEO, his technical team was able to “complete retrofitting of a turbocharger … placing the power company in a position to continue meeting its daily peak demand.”

The events leading up to the shortage in electricity at the state-owned company, last week, had forced Prime Minister, Dr. Ralph Gonsalves to assume responsibility for Energy after what he described as tardiness from the country’s electricity company.

During his parliamentary statement on Thursday last week the Prime Minister lashed out at the Electricity Company over its “failure to carryout some functions that were foreseeable in preventing the electricity shortage.”

“The question of the tardiness in getting the parts and making certain decisions and implementing those decisions is simply unacceptable,” the Prime Minister said.

Dr. Gonsalves noted then, that while the government would take responsibility for the problems at Vinlec, he would not take the blame for Vinlec’s failure to provide sufficient electricity to Vincentians since August 12, 2006.

Though a 3.5-mega watt generator, which was purchased in 2002, remains inactive until its problems are rectified, 20 mega watts of power are now once more being produced by Vinlec’s power plants at Cane Hall, Cumberland, Richmond and South Rivers.

The Cane Hall power plant currently has 13-diesel generator engines from which electricity is supplied.