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Puerto Rico's power struggles. [1]

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Date: 2022-07-01

ABC NEWS - JUNE 29, 2022 Puerto Rico sets 7th electric rate increase in just a year amid continuing power outages and ... economic crisis. h/t Jessica Sutherland, DK staff

..For a client that consumes 800 kilowatt hours, the new rate will be 33 cents per kwh, compared with the previous 29 cents. The average U.S. electric rate is 14 cents per kwh, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. [The increase goes into effect Friday, July 1], angering many on the island of 3.2 million people who just deal with constant power outages blamed on crumbling infrastructure due to lack of maintenance... Th[is] increase comes as crews begin rebuilding Puerto Rico’s power grid that Hurricane Maria razed in September 2017, leavig some customers without power for up to a year. [The seven rate hikes across 12 months date back to when] LUMA, a private company, took over transmission and distribution a year ago from Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority , [privatization] which is burdened with $9 billion in debt and is trying to emerge from bankruptcy. Puerto Rico’s Energy Bureau said it would revise the electric rate by or before Oct. 1 amid concerns that the newest increase would spook potential investors already wary about the state of the island's electric grid. Puerto Rico’s power plants depend on petroleum to generate about 97% of electricity, with renewables generating roughly 3%….

WALL ST JOURNAL - JUNE 27, 2022 McKinsey Clients Won Puerto Rico Contracts as Firm Advised Government. The consulting firm has helped the territory’s oversight board review contracts with companies that are also its clients. McKinsey has collected roughly $120 million for advising Puerto Rico’s financial-oversight board.

McKinsey & Co. has been a top government consultant since 2016 in Puerto Rico, helping the U.S. territory’s financial overseers manage its spending. In that time, corporate clients of the consulting firm have won tens of billions of dollars of government business, new disclosures show. Since McKinsey began its work for Puerto Rico’s financial-oversight board, the firm has helped the board review and evaluate contracts with companies that are also McKinsey’s consulting clients, according to disclosures it filed in federal court last month, and other public documents. McKinsey clients include some of the largest fuel suppliers to Puerto Rico, an infrastructure company with a major role in operating the country’s electrical grid, and contractors who….

CANARY MEDIA - JUNE 8, 2022 Puerto Ricans are powering their own rooftop solar boom. Residents and shop owners are installing solar-plus-battery systems in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Will the government get on board?



Residents and shop owners are installing solar-plus-battery systems in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Will the government get on board? FEMA - JUNE 6, 2022 FEMA Announces Progress in Puerto Rico’s Power Grid Work

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Puerto Rico's electric generation, transmission and distribution system is on its way to becoming more robust with the approval of funds for 15 projects under FEMA’s Accelerated Award’s Strategy, known as FAASt. The projects represent more than $107.3 million in approved federal funding to kickstart what will become a more reliable electric grid for all Puerto Rico residents. In addition to these 15 projects, an Architecture and Engineering project was approved in October of last year. “Today we are once again demonstrating that both federal and state government agencies, as well as the private sector, have a common purpose in order for Puerto Rico's reconstruction to continue moving forward. Teamwork is a priority for all of us, and together with FEMA, COR3, the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority and LUMA, we are on the road to a strong and resilient energy system for our island. We continue to move ahead and speed up the pace of the remaining work, because the excellent relationship we have with federal government agencies is delivering results,” said Governor Pedro R. Pierluisi, who last week was in Washington, D.C., and spoke with U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm about the reconstruction and resiliency of the electric grid. The historic amount of funds to rebuild the island’s power grid represents an opportunity to build back better. Hazard mitigation is key as an additional measure to protect the federal investment. Likewise, this allows for the use of higher quality materials, among other planning measures...

LaPRENSA LATINA - JUNE 3, 2022 Worries about Puerto Rico’s power grid as hurricane season starts h/t Kerry Eleveld, DK staff

Puerto Ricans, already grumbling about much higher electricity rates under privatization, are expressing concern that the new operators of the power grid lack the experience and knowledge to cope with the challenges of hurricane season, which began June 1. ...It was nearly a year ago that Puerto Rican authorities awarded the contract for electricity distribution and transmission to LUMA Energy, a joint venture of Canada-based ATCO [Group] and US firm Quanta Services. State-run utility AEE[PREPA] was left with the responsibility for generating electricity. [Angel Figueroa Jaramillo, head] of the UTIER union, which represents workers in the electrical and water sectors, told Efe that Puerto Rico’s power infrastructure is very complex, comprising 36,000 mi (57,936 km) of above-ground and buried wires. “That makes adequately maintaining the electric system much more difficult … Firstly, no electric system in the world is infallible against nature, but there are always mechanisms one can use to reduce the possibility of damage,” [but] LUMA lacks sufficient trained technicians to ensure reliability. “LUMA has demonstrated during the year that it has been operating that it daily has thousands of subscribers without service...”

MICROGRID KNOWLEDGE - JANUARY 17, 2022 Puerto Rico’s utility needs to act on solar, storage and microgrids [as ordered by regulators], says industry group

..The Solar and Energy Storage Association of Puerto Rico (SESA) said the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA {Autoridad de Energía Eléctrica de Puerto Rico, AEE} needs to push forward to meet the island’s aggressive renewable portfolio standard — 40% renewables by 2025 and 100% by 2050. This will mean acquiring about 3,750 MW of renewables by the 2025 deadline, according to Javier Rua-Jovet, chief policy officer for SESA. In a Dec. 28, 2021, order, the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau (PREB) required PREPA to submit by January 10 an additional four projects of solar PV and an additional six storage bids, which is more than the storage and PV PREPA has said it has acquired. At this time, PREPA had not met the January 10 deadline, said Rua-Jovet. “PREB basically said, ‘We told you what we wanted, we want 1,000 MW of solar and 500 MW of storage for round one [the first phase of the request for proposals] and you’re going to do that...” The utility must have a contracted project built within 24 months of signing a power purchase agreement, he added.

JUNE 3, 2021 - AL DIA Puerto Ricans fight against forced privatization of their power grid amid rising cost. Demonstrators blocked a highway in Puerto Rico to show out against impositions forced by the privatization of PREPA.

LUMA Energy recently took over the transmission and distribution of power for [PREPA], the main energy supplier for its 3.3 million inhabitants, and one of the two largest public power utilities in the United States. The move marks a major step towards transforming Puerto Rico’s government-owned power provider, but so far [has] has caused protest, higher energy bills, and ignited the settler-colonist relationship between the U.S. and Puerto Rico. Natural disasters are not Puerto Rico’s biggest cause for concern. Rather, it is the decades of mismanagement of Puerto Rico’s power grid, and its government’s inability to comply with U.S. regulations to distribute relief funds — which the U.S. seriously delayed — designated by the federal government. h/t oalperstein The hurricanes were the initial factor, but it was the mismanaged power grid that caused the 11-month blackout back in 2017. The agreement approved by Puerto Rico’s government and a federal control board calls for LUMA to spend billions in upgrading its energy grid. The majority of these funds are coming from FEMA. In turn, Luma will be receiving hundreds of millions of dollars for taking over the system. The Associated Press reports officials are hoping LUMA can do better than Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority, which has struggled to restore power to the island since 2017, while also juggling $9 billion in debt. Even after going private, the control board and Puerto Rican government may be forced into an eventual power rate increase to meet bondholders’ demands. That’s essentially what’s already happening….

The Oklahoma City-based company that [claims to have] rebuilt Puerto Rico's electric grid after Hurricane Maria devastated the island in 2017 is still fighting to be paid for that work. Mammoth Energy [Services] chief executive officer Arty Straehla said it's shocking to him [SHOCKING!] that it's now nearly five years after the storm and PREPA, the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, still has not paid them in full. "Our men and women that went to work on that island did not leave until the lights were on and the power was back on," Straehla said in an interview last week in Oklahoma….

despite the June 29, 2022 report that the seventh rate hike in a year “comes as crews begin rebuilding Puerto Rico’s power grid that Hurricane Maria razed in September 2017.”

The power struggle, and the power struggles, go on...

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/7/1/2107696/-Puerto-Rico-s-power-struggles

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