Energy
demand: Small businesses stand to lose
By Louis B Homer
Trinidad Express
Port
Spain
Petroleumworldtt.com
02 11 07
Industrial
expansion in the energy sector continues to be a
major concern for Trinidad and Tobago Electricity
Commission, as it relates to the supply of adequate
energy to service new industries.
"In
five years the anticipated demand for power in the
commercial and industrial sectors will be increased
by five per cent per annum above the current needs.
In the residential sector, the increase has been
estimated to be six per cent per annum for the next
five years," Inderjit Singh, General Manager
of T&TEC said recently.
To
meet the expected energy demands in the foreseeable
future, T&TEC has embarked on a $1.12 billion
capital expenditure during the next three years.
Assuring
investors and consumers that there will be an adequate
supply to meet the projected demand, Public Utilities
Minister Pennelope Beckles said during a formal
visit to Powergen's new plant at Point Lisas, "the
planning horizon for electricity generation extends
to 2012 and this planning process is robust and
ongoing and focuses on ensuring that the necessary
generating facilities are ready and able to meet
load requirement."
The
system is already experiencing short falls in supply,
with frequent outages now adversely affecting productivity,
especially in the small business sector and domestic
customers.
The
recent outages need to be addressed urgently, said
Paul Quesnel, President of the Trinidad and Tobago
Manufacturers Association.
He
said his organisation had approached Beckles requesting
details from the ministry on how it proposes to
reduce or eliminate the frequency of power outages.
"Small
manufacturers who do not have standby generators
are the victims of an inadequate power supply,"
said Quesnel. "Many of them are not in a position
to acquire standby generators, and because they
depend entirely on T&TEC for their supply of
electricity they have no choice but to wait until
supplies are restored to continue operations."
He
added: "This can be disastrous, especially
in cases where the raw material used by these manufacturers
are of a perishable nature."
Quesnel
noted that over the last two weeks there were several
outages, but though there had been an improvement
in supplies the association felt that outages should
become a thing of the past.
If
this is not achieved within a reasonable time, industrial
development will suffer a setback, it was feared.
The
T&TEC general manager said he expected Powergen
and Trinity Power to increase their generating capacity
significantly with the construction of two steam
generation plants.
He
said a new power station is to be constructed at
Union Estate, La Brea and that a large amount of
the power that would be processed at La Brea will
be used by Allutrint to produce aluminium.
Singh
said T&TEC planned to install about 100 km of
new transmission lines as well as 12 new substations
to interconnect the new power station to existing
load centres.
"Substations
will be constructed at Chatham, Reform, Debe, Rio
Claro, Penal, Brechin Castle, and Union Estate,
said Singh, giving assurance that there will be
adequate supplies during high profile developments
or events that would be taking place in the near
future.
He
cited the World Cricket Cup which will be held at
Queen's Park Oval, Port of Spain and the waterfront
project at the Port of Spain harbour.
Improvements
are expected in the area of domestic customers.
The system of computing charges to customers based
on estimated billing will shortly be eliminated,
and there will be a system in which domestic meters
could be read from equipment which will be installed
in a centralised location, Singh said.
"We
plan to completely eliminate the reading of meters
on domestic premises."
Singh
said Government soon will be inviting tenders for
eight trailer mounted generators to be used as part
of T&TEC's disaster preparedness efforts for
this year's hurricane season.
Trinidad
Express
Wednesday, February 7th 2007
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©2006 Trinidad Express. All Rights Reserved.
