Monday, July 21, 2008

Dominican blackouts to improve

After nearly 2 weeks of irregularly long and widespread blackouts in the Dominican Republic, authorities have announced that a power upgrade to the Dominican Corporation of State Electricity Companies (CDEEE) will go a long way towards improving the situation.

From yesterday's Dominican Today:

Power companies were instructed to maintain their output at 85 percent so the sectors which receive the least energy get 18 hours of service. The national energy demand is around 2,000 megawtts and the current generation is of around 1,700 megawatts. Today the CDEEE will pay US$4 (million) of the US$16 million owed to the power company Cogentrix, which contributes 300 megawatts to the system and which had shut down several plants. Since yesterday several plants around the country began to enter the system, after debts were paid and failures corrected, Segura said. He said another factor affecting the power grid is that the hydroelectrics, which contribute almost 200 megawtts, have been generating less as the lack of rain maintains their waters levels low.

In today's Listin Diario, Radhames Segura, of the CDEEE, explained that the recent spate of blackouts across the urban sectors of the country was the result of a particularly rough patch of increasing energy needs, rising cost of production, and faltering customer payments.

Sources: Dominican Today, Listin Diario, CDEEE, Wikipedia

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Miguel:
I think there is a mistake on th dollar value you posted US$4billion
from US$16 millions. Which is it?
Don't you proof read the material before you post it?

TAR

Erwin C. said...

There is an error on the dollar amount you pointed out but that was made by the original source quoted in the post (Dominican Today).

If you have a problem with that mistake tell them.