Bahamas struggles for electricity amid heatwave, BPL works to add capacity

The Bahamas Power and Light Company announced that it is working to add additional generating capacity in New Providence following two days of record-breaking temperatures, which caused a significant increase in demand. 

The company also said that the increase in demand also coincides with the sudden failure of one of BPL’s major units which produces around 25MW of power along with the unavailability of around 25MW of rental generation because of planned maintenance and other issues.

Because of all these reasons, the company is forced to do load shedding, which is affecting the normal lives of the citizens and residents of the Bahamas.

According to the information, BPL was able to return its unit to service shortly after 6 pm on Sunday, but because of load demands exceeding projects by 20MW, there still remains a shortfall, which is causing load shedding during peak hours in New Providence.

The company said that it is presently working  with its rental generation partners to return around 10MW of power to the grid within the next 24 hours and another 10MW should be available for the citizens by the end of this week. 

Meanwhile, the company is also working to return three units which are offline because of the scheduled maintenance by the end of this month and these units will be adding 59 MW to the present capacity. 

The BPL emphasised that load shedding remains a possibility if unforeseen incidents impact the available capacity at this plants and if temperatures continues to rise over 100 degrees Fahrenheit, causing an increase in demand. 

The company has also assured the customers that it uses all available resources to limit the supply interruptions as the Battery Energy Storage System will help to reduce the generation shortfall with the company continuing to use the Generation Assistance Plan where large commercial consumers self-generate to allow BPL to redistribute power.

The issues which are being faced by the company is because of the rising temperatures not only in Bahamas but the entire Caribbean.