When was the last time you heard good news from BEL? Seems that every time
we get a release from one the highest earning companies in the country, it’s
another tale of doom and impending calamity. This time though, it’s not
just Canadian wolf-crying...this time, there’s real reason for alarm.
That’s because CFE, the Mexican power company – which provides
a good third of BEL’s power supply has cancelled its power supply contract
with BEL. According to a release from BEL, CFE is cancelling the guaranteed
power supply contract with BEL, due to what’s called Force Majeure reasons
– force majure means an act of God or other unexpected uncontrollable
events.
So what is this unforeseen event? CFE says that its generation capacity has
been significantly limited, as a result of problems with gas availability, generation
equipment and shortfall in hydroelectric production. CFE has, though, opened
the door for a new contract to provide 50 Megawatts of economic and emergency
power to Belize. Needless to say, this power would be more expensive and what
costs BEL more always ends up costing you more, so…
But the good news is that BEL does have enough local generation power to meet
Belize’s energy need without CFE. In fact, since CFE started with its
problems in April, BEL has been able to maintain by juggling local generation
sources, including the Hydro Maya Limited; the plant at Belize Aquaculture Limited
in the south and BEL’s Gas Turbine Unit at mile 8.
We were unable o get further comment from BEL or the PUC to discuss how long
local sources can hold up.
Email
Print