Engineers working to connect second Power Ship before Christmas -PM Phillips

With the arrival of a second power generation vessel in Guyana, the Guyana Power and Light company’s grid capacity is expected to grow by approximately 60 megawatts. Prime Minister Mark Phillips today announced that engineers are working to integrate the additional power before Christmas.

On the sidelines of today’s Parliamentary Sitting today, the Prime Minister noted that works are at an advanced stage to ensure more power is supplied in time for Christmas.

“We are about 80% completed in terms of the transmission so as soon as we finish the transmission it is all about hooking up the ship to the transmission and hooking up the current, so that the people of Guyana will get in the first instance 60 additional megawatts and in due course it will go up to an additional 75 megawatts but definitely as promised for Christmas 60 additional megawatts and we are confident that we will be able to deliver that before Christmas Day,” the Prime Minister stated.

This is the second power ship that the government has rented within a year to address the country’s electricity woes. The price tag for the rental is expected to run into hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Government believes that the rental of the power ships is feasible, and it will be a short term solution while the gas-to-energy project is being finalized.

Prime Minister Phillips said the immediate goal is to ensure stable electricity for the holiday season.

“Whatever challenge that they have is construction related and they are working through it and we have all confidence that they will deliver in time for Christmas. The testing phase is included in the commissioning in time for Christmas and that should not be long, once they are connected they will start testing and people will be notified because they will have to shut down some areas while we test,” Mr. Phillips said.

To facilitate its connection to the local grid, a 3.9 km double circuit 69 kV transmission line is currently under construction from Ruimveldt, where the ship is docked, to GPL’s New Georgetown Substation. The Prime Minister believes the construction will be completed within days.