No more load shedding

By JOHN RAVELO and AGNES DONATO
REPORTERS

Just when the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. anticipated its power load shedding to continue even after Christmas Day, the Babauta administration yesterday pledged a total of $2 million to the beleaguered utility firm for the next two weeks to end the looming power outages on Saipan.

Gov. Juan N. Babauta made the decision a day after CUC began load shedding due to its lack of money to buy fuel. Villages experienced two-hour power outages, in accordance to CUC’s load shedding schedule.

According to press secretary Pete Callaghan, the governor is also considering the possibility of reinstating the state of emergency, which would give him full authority to reprogram funds to CUC.

The state of emergency was only lifted effective last Friday, Dec. 16, 2005.

Callaghan said CUC would use the $2 million from the Governor’s Office to pay for a fuel delivery on Jan. 6, 2006.

This fuel supply should be enough to keep power plants 1 and 4 running through Jan. 26, 2006.

Overall, the government has paid $5.6 million to CUC since fiscal year 2006 started on Oct. 1, 2005.

Callaghan said the $2 million, as with other funds previously paid to CUC, would be considered an advance payment for the government’s utility bills.

“Right now, the government’s bills are paid for until September 2006. I guess the additional $2 million settles our bills for October and November,” he said.

The government’s average utility cost is about $750,000 a month.

CUC’s acting executive director, Sohale Samari, said the CNMI government would give the utility firm an additional $500,000 today for the purchase of fuel for two Saipan power plants. The Finance Department issued CUC a $500,000-check, not $700,000 as earlier reported, last Tuesday.

“The governor has pledged full financial support to CUC,” Samari said after meeting with administration officials yesterday afternoon. “We’re going to have full power this Christmas. Merry Christmas to [everyone]!”

Samari said the government pledged to give CUC another $500,000 next week, and $1 million the following week.

Samari said Mobil would deliver fuel to Saipan for Power Plant 1 on Friday. Yesterday, he said the CUC would be purchasing some $100,000-worth of fuel for Power Plant 4 to prevent power outages on Saipan’s schools.

On Tuesday, CUC board chair Frank Guerrero said fuel supply for Power Plant 4, which also supplies electricity to the Commonwealth Health Center, would run out yesterday had it not been for power load shedding. He said Power Plant 1, which supplies electricity to most parts of Saipan, would run out of fuel by weekend.

WORSENING POWER CRISIS STALLED

The administration’s fuel subsidy averted the anticipated worsening of Saipan’s power situation. Before Samari met with administration officials yesterday afternoon, he said CUC would resort to “extensive” load shedding even after Christmas.

Samari directed the CUC to purchase $100,000-worth of fuel yesterday to sustain the operation of Power Plant 4, which was running out of fuel. “If we don’t do that, all schools will not have power,” he said.

While he assured that no load shedding would take place beginning 4pm on the eve of Christmas and on Christmas Day, he said it would resume by Dec. 26 and become worse—possibly up to 4 hours in various parts of Saipan. He said even Tinian and Rota might also resort to load shedding to prolong their respective fuel supply.

“The government is doing the best it can,” Samari said. He said the government has not been ignoring the power crisis, but it is really just experiencing a “difficult situation.”

Samari thanked Mobil, though, for cooperating with the utility firm, saying that the oil company recently delivered fuel to Rota even though the island’s utility firm had already exceeded its credit limit.

After a meeting with administration officials, Samari assured that power load shedding would end by 5pm yesterday or today.

The CUC resorted to load shedding beginning last Tuesday. It said that it could not pay for the scheduled fuel deliveries on that day, less than a week after the lifting of the governor’s emergency declaration that put the CUC under his direct control.

Samari said then that the CUC needs some $2 million of subsidy from the CNMI government this week—plus $1 million each for the two succeeding weeks—to ensure sufficient fuel stock that would support power generation until Jan. 9, 2006.