The netizens of the Guam community are now really angered and “throwing stones” at Guam Power Authority (GPA) for having an intermittent electric power service saying that the power company is already hurting them. Residents and Business owners alike are now taking their sentiments and rage on the social media, as the Guam Power Authority continuously announces local power outage notices.
The Residents’ Outburst
However, residents and business owners said that the maintenance and repair have been on-going for the longest time and the electric power service has not improved a bit.
GPA is now faced with problems after problem as complaints from the angry mob are piling.
The fire and explosion at Cabras 3 and 4 last August 31 and the recent boiler leak that brought Cabras 2 and MEC 8 unit down, had just made it even worse for GPA as they experienced another 100 megawatts shortage heading the previous weekend.
According to GPA spokesman Art Perez as earlier reported, the MEC No. 8 unit has been brought down to work on liners and the Cabras No. 2 unit has also been brought down to work on a boiler tube leak. GPA is asking the community to conserve electricity as much as possible announcing load shedding on top of scheduled power outage that was announced earlier.
Perez said that MEC No. 9 was already scheduled for maintenance repairs on October 23.”Typically the demand for power is lower on the weekends; as such, the unit is scheduled for this type of work. Unfortunately, Cabras 2 experienced a boiler tube leak during the early hours of the following day. Work on a steam engine (Cabras 2) takes longer to repair as it involves a period of cooling down to allow for workers to enter the boiler (confined space) to make repairs. This was done by October 25 (Sunday) to bring the unit up to its current output of 45 megawatts.”
This is where the netizens of the island pour their steam on the GPA’s unofficial social media page. “Raising prices due to issues caused by incompetence and could have all been prevented by preventive maintenance and upkeep,” a resident was quoted saying to GPA’s incompetency and referring to its increased of service rate that was put to effect, October 1st.
GPA is also being blamed for electronic appliances that broke down due to fluctuating electricity. According to a Talafofo netizen’s post on the social media page “It is Just Ridiculous!” experiencing electric power that had been turning on and off on five occasions last October 24. The residents are saying that GPA personnel of all people should know how to keep the power going since their service had been paid well.
Effects of Outages to Business
The business sector on the other hand has a different and more serious take about the outages and load shedding since almost all businesses whether big or small, rely so on electricity to power up their commerce.
Business owners can only do so much by using back up generators which is of course is less efficient and more expensive.
This evidence is clear that small businesses that do not have back up generators to use during power outages, will take the biggest hit. It will definitely have a negative impact on anybody’s business and cash flow resulting to reduced income.
According to the US Emergency Management in Virginia, power companies like the GPA use power outage intentionally especially during times of high demand in electricity or what is commonly known as “Peak Hours.”
This is to prevent any other power plant on the same grid to reach its maximum power supply and prevent it from shutting down that may lead to a blackout. The US Emergency Management also added that Brownouts or Power outages can have adverse effects on computers hardware, software, and electrical equipment.
This is just what happened a small business owner in Dededo. She said that she is facing a great loss in terms her income that went down 60% for this year from what she earned from the previous years of the same month.
She added that on top of her monthly rent for the store, she has to earn extra cash as her register (cash register) and computer are currently not working. There were even times that she had to call her staff to take the day-off because of the scheduled power interruption in the area where her business is located.
Somehow, she recounted, that day the power didn’t go off as scheduled, instead it went off the next day when she already declared business as usual to her employees. She paid the employees salary for that day as the result.
We’ve asked Mr. Perez just recently through email on how GPA will address the business owners whose businesses have been hurt badly by the effect of the current power crisis, for which he said “We cannot speak for business sector, however, GPA issues the outage schedules for everyone including business organizations as part of our outreach efforts. We do so in advance as much as possible to aid in their planning for business interruption or their operations to deploy their back up generators.
What Experts Say
Michael Bruch, Risk Consultant at Allianz Global Corporate and Specialty (AGCS), said on his earliest interviews with the press, that power companies need to check their vulnerability to power outage and what contingency they have in place. ”Controlling the risk should not just be limited to having emergency back-up generators” he added.
In addition, he said that many companies are not really prepared for any business disruptions that caused by power outages, and most of these companies are fully unaware of the true cost and impact that it can have to their daily operations.
Residents and business owners would like to know if GPA is capable to handle the power crisis, which is according to them did not happen if they are guided by proper maintenance of the power plant.
Long wait
When asked for a timetable for Guam’s power to be stabilized, Perez said “We are very confident in the stability of our power system. It is prepared to weather major storms and has received the confidence of the world financial markets as indicated by our bond ratings (stable and investment grade). We do have problems at this moment, however, we have plans in place and being acted upon to resolve them. Our most instable period is between now and January. Thereafter, stability will steadily increase. We expect stability in service within a 8 to 12 month period. He added that “GPA is working hard to deploy our generation capacity alternatives solutions to bring online backup generation as well as deploy initiatives to help minimize the impact any outage has on our ratepayers; we are taking this very seriously.”/The Junction News Team
