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PP1 back to two engines
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Posted on Sep 02 2008
The Commonwealth Utilities Corp. was able to get a second engine at Power Plant 1 up and running yesterday, but both engines are producing far less than they were designed for.
CUC employees were able to repair engine 8 and, together with engine 6, is producing approximately 8.5 megawatts total, said Gary Camacho, acting Power Division manager.
Each engine is designed to produce 13 megawatts, and each was regularly producing five megawatts a few weeks ago when they were operational.
“Those units are not producing a sufficient amount that they normally produce,” Camacho said. “And currently, we’re going to have to continue load shedding.”
On Friday, CUC released a revised load shedding schedule where each area experienced three-hour outages three times over a 24-hour period.
CUC was unable to follow the schedule, which was devised for two engines running at Power Plant 1, over the weekend because only engine 6 was working. Some areas experienced outages for as much as eight hours at a time.
Camacho said CUC tries to follow the schedule, but with the current high temperatures and the state of the engines, production output must sometimes be reduced.
Employees were hoping to repair engine 3 and get it running by yesterday evening, which would add five megawatts of power, Camacho said.
Upper Gualo Rai and Taro Sue, which make up feeder 3, also experienced additional outages yesterday when CUC workers repaired an electric pole that was damaged yesterday when a car slammed into it, Camacho said. Employees also installed an air break in the afternoon. The area was without power from about 1:30 pm to 4pm.
With the two engines at Power Plant 1 and the nine engines at Power Plant 4 working, CUC is currently producing approximately 22 to 23 megawatts of power for the island. Approximately 41 megawatts are needed to sufficiently power the island.
The second of four engine units arrived from Aggreko recently. The generators are expected to add 15 to 18 megawatts by Sept. 16 or 17.
