BL&P defends power restoration effort, hurricane plan

Amid widespread criticism of Light and Power’s efforts to restore power after Hurricane Elsa and the level of preparations for the hurricane season, the electric company’s spokeswoman insisted Monday that all necessary preparations were made and plans were currently functioning as designed.

BL&P Manager of Communications Jackie Marshall-Clarke told Voice of Barbados’ Down to Brasstacks that though many customers were still currently out of power, several BL&P teams were able to begin restoration work to the system as early as Friday afternoon because of well-planned actions devised for such circumstances.

Marshall-Clarke said: “Every system is unique, and the mere fact that we were able to get up and start responding and start restorations from as early as Friday evening after the storm passed, tells us that we only could have turned around like that if we had a plan, and we were prepared to do it.

“I don’t think that Light and Power is claiming to be perfect in any way, but I am telling you there are many times as we so often do, go back to the drawing board, we talk, we analyse, we revaluate, we strategize, and we come again.”

In response to several complaints from customers who were still out of power though located in ‘small pockets’ near to communities who themselves had power, Marshall-Clarke said such instances were dependent on the size of the particular grid and the work needed to have those small number of customers back online at the earliest possible hour, verses bringing a much larger community of users back onto the grid.

She explained: “The feeder is really the word we use when it comes to the distribution lines that feed all of the different homes. On the Providence feeder in Christ Church, there are 7,132 customers; on the Sam Lord’s feeder in St. Philip, there are 5736 customers.

“While we are doing restoration, we go after getting as many customers back online, back on the power supply as quickly and as safely as possible.

“So we go in search of whatever the fault is, maybe on the Providence feeder, so that once the guys get out there investigate, find out what it is and get it fixed, we bring 7,132 customers back into to power supply. Sometimes what that means in the effort of trying to restore those bigger groups of customers, sometimes we have to leave the smaller pocket of customers to get to after that big job. It is not that we are leaving them for last, there’s a reason, it is part of the restoration strategy and we still will get to you.”

Noting the heightened level of public interest in seeing more of the distribution power lines being located underground as they currently are in Bridgetown, and along the newly paved Highway 1, Marshall-Clarke said that more underground laying of lines will always be on the cards, but practicality, cost, and maintenance were important factors to take into consideration.

She said: “Maintenance and restoration – when there is a fault, or someone calls and say there is a problem and says there is a power outage, we obviously can send people to the site, they look up at the pole, they trace the line, identify what has happened and they fix it. Understand that when we move everything underground, the whole set-up changes, because you have to go digging to get to your infrastructure underneath to investigate and find out what the problem is.”
(SB)