Damaged cable at Kingston triggered series of Good Friday power outages – GPL

…says Kingston, Garden of Eden plants crashed, post-mortem to be done

The Guyana Power and Light (GPL) has revealed that what started as a damaged cable at its Kingston location, escalated into multiple shutdowns at the Kingston and Garden of Eden plants and, ultimately, blackouts throughout Good Friday.
On Good Friday, thousands of customers were forced to endure power outages after system shutdowns by the GPL. Although power was eventually restored, this was not until well into the night. This resulted in citizens taking to social media to vent their frustration.
Following the unfortunate incidents, Prime Minister, (Retired) Brigadier Mark Phillips, who has responsibility for the energy sector, visited GPL’s control centre, where he was updated on the situation by the Systems Control and Operations Manager, Navin Deonarine.
“At 2:44 this morning (Friday), we experienced a shutdown. A total shutdown. And that was caused by a damaged cable at our Kingston location. We worked assiduously to repower the system and fix that problem. However, upon reclosing, we experienced another failure at that location,” Deonarine explained.
“We repowered again. Subsequently this afternoon, we experienced another shutdown whereby a situation occurred at the Garden of Eden location. That was investigated and we subsequently found what was the issue. And we corrected it. We have powered back the entire system this evening. And we continue to supply the country with reliable power as we speak.”

Deonarine noted that there was still some work to be done, as well as a post-mortem that would ascertain the root causes of the shutdown. This, the engineer explained, will help them to prevent a reoccurrence.
Meanwhile, the Prime Minister, who was accompanied by Home Affairs Minister Robeson Benn and GPL’s Executive and Management Committee member Kesh Nandlall, also sought to reassure citizens that the power would remain uninterrupted for the weekend.
“We’re here at the control centre. And you’ve heard the technical brief from the systems engineer. And we’re all assured that the power is now on and it will be on for the rest of the evening and the rest of the weekend,” he said.
Only a few days ago, it was reported that GPL would be partnering with InterEnergy Group (IEG), a Dominican Republic (DR)based energy company with bold plans to expand the use of renewable energy in the region, to help the company better manage its electricity services.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) had been signed by the company and GPL back in January of this year. The agreement is expected to see the Dominican Republic company lend its expertise in electricity generation and transmission, in addition to smart metering.
When the MoU between GPL and IEG was signed, both companies agreed to engage in discussions to explore opportunities and identify potential areas for collaboration and development of GPL through the implementation of IEG’s expertise and know-how in electricity generation, transmission and distribution, and in the management of electricity systems and assets.
GPL has been dealing with power failure woes for some time, with the Government having to bring in 29.9 megawatts of additional power in the form of generators last year. It is anticipated that once the Gas-to-Energy (GtE) Project becomes online next year, Guyanese will benefit from not only cheaper but more reliable power.
As of January this year, the marine offloading facility has been completed, and 26 kilometres (km) of onshore pipelines have been installed. Once completed, the project will allow Guyanese to benefit from 50 per cent reduced electricity costs.
As it is now, electricity demand has been steadily rising. This year alone, electricity demand is projected to peak at 236 megawatts; however, GPL can generate approximately 180 megawatts of power.
In 2020, demand was around 120 megawatts and this grew to 136 megawatts in 2021; 156 megawatts in 2022; and then peaked at 184 megawatts in 2023. Last year’s peak was recorded when all industrial customers were on the grid.
Another issue that has severely affected GPL is the theft of electricity, which continues to cost it millions of dollars every year. Thousands of people, mostly in depressed communities and squatting areas, climb utility poles and attach wires to GPL’s network, and many of them tamper with meters so that the instruments would register less than their actual energy consumption.