Exactly three weeks after category one Hurricane Elsa dealt a severe blow to sections of Barbados, destroying houses and downing trees and power lines, the lone power company is reporting completion of the restoration work costing in the millions. The only premises not restored are those in need of house repairs.
Director of Operations at the Barbados Light & Power Company (BL&P) Ltd. Johann Greaves has disclosed that following initial assessment, financial losses from damage to the company have so far reached around $2.5 million.
He told a Friday media briefing “I am glad to report that as of today, we have completed restoration of customers impacted by Hurricane Elsa who was fit to be restored that we were aware of,” said Greaves.
He explained that over 100 houses damaged and in need of repairs were not in a condition to receive electricity just yet.
“When I say we are fully restored it would not encompass those persons who need to have some repairs done to their houses. Also, we have very few customers whose electrical infrastructure on their house was damaged, and therefore it necessitates repairs by the customer before we can affect [restoration],” he explained.
Greaves said he was pleased that the BL&P workers were able to carry out the necessary work incident-free over the past three weeks.
He also dismissed any criticism that the restoration work took longer than it should have because the company did not have adequate technical staff.
Greaves said the restoration took the time it did because of the level of effort that was required including the clearing of huge trees, poles, and line replacement, as well as repairs related to properties of specific customers.
“All available resources including the four-person crew that we had from Dominica were fully utilised during this process to complete the restoration effort in just about three weeks,” he said.
“We maintain a very skilled, experienced, and appropriate complement of staff to efficiently run our day-to-day operation including the important tree trimming and infrastructure maintenance. During such times as what we have just experienced, similar to what happened in other jurisdictions, what we do is utilise contractors that are appropriately trained . . . we rely on some of our affiliate crew and on some of the regional crew.”
He insisted that the most cost-effective approach for the company was to maintain the current staffing levels “for our normal day-to-day operations” but tap into additional human resources when the need arises.
“We continue to leverage those partnerships we have with our contractors, our regional partners, and affiliates and we are continuing to build our contractor pool as well,” he added, pointing out that the services of retired or former BL&P workers were not necessary this time around.
In relation to the damages the company suffered as a result of the Friday, July 2 category one hurricane system, Greaves told reporters the costs were still being tallied.
“But as of earlier this week we were in the region of just around $2.5 million,” he said.
Greaves noted of the 72,170 poles on the network, only 358 or 0.5 per cent sustained damage. Some fell, others leaned and some were broken.
Of the 11,472 transformers in service, there was damage to 25 or 0.2 per cent of them, which had to be replaced. A number of fuses and power lines also had to be replaced.
“I would say that overall our electrical grid performed very well especially after being stressed just a few weeks ago from the freak storm and even earlier in the year when we had the ashfall. However, the damages from the hurricane were quite major, which meant that we had to do quite a bit of repair before power could be safely restored,” he said.
Greaves, head of the BL&P’s hurricane team, agreed that the company could have done better in some aspects of its restoration efforts, pointing out that a review was ongoing but several lessons have been learned so far.
“There are obviously areas that we can improve in,” he said.
He said areas for improvement and where work has already begun or would begin almost immediately would be in pole replacement, customer education, and engagement on vegetation management, substation resilient building, and working closely with the telecommunications companies regarding their infrastructure management on the poles.
However, he stressed that the company was “very much prepared to deal with any system” that affects the island during this hurricane season.
He recalled that within the first week after the storm over 90 per cent of the company’s more than 130,000 customers received power.
(marlonmadden@barbadostoday.bb)
