CUC: Rota power plant is most fuel efficient

Commonwealth Utilities Corp. executive director Abe Utu Malae rates the Rota power plant as the most fuel efficient in the Commonwealth after the recent completion of various improvements.

Malae disclosed yesterday that the Office of Insular Affairs and the local Capital Improvement Project office paid for two brand new generators and other power plant improvements on Rota.

These were all completed in December 2011.

Malae describes the January production report on Rota as very encouraging.

According to him, Rota’s fuel consumption per unit of energy produced declined by 23 percent.

The Rota power plant’s average monthly fuel consumption last year was 70,901 gallons. In the January 2012 report, monthly usage was at 54,891 gallons, a decline of 16,010 gallons.

The amount of energy expended to produce power at the plant also declined by 76 percent-from 73,063 kWh a month in 2011 to 17,220 kWh in January 2012.

Lube oil consumption also declined, this time by 13 percent-from the 2011 monthly average of 276 gallons to 241 gallons in January 2012.

“The savings was worth about $80,000 from that one power plant on Rota. These savings are computed directly into the LEAC [levelized energy adjustment clause] and thus, at the end of the six-month reckoning period, this will appear as an ‘over-collection’ and would reduce the next LEAC,” Malae said yesterday.

The $80,846 per month savings is composed of the following: fuel savings per month ($63,673); station usage savings per month ($16,753); and lube oil savings per month ($420).

According to Malae, Rota had the least efficient of the islands’ power plants before the new engines were commissioned in December. Now Rota is the most efficient, producing 14.6 kWh per gallon of diesel, followed by Tinian with 14.1 kWh/gallon. Saipan produces 13.6 kWh per gallon of diesel.

In terms of most efficient per “station service”-or percent of energy expended to produce electricity-the Rota power plant is the most efficient at 2.1 percent followed by power plant 4 on Saipan at 3.1 percent; the Tinian power plant with 5.5 percent; power plant 1 on Saipan at 6.1 percent; and power plant 2 on Saipan at 8.0 percent.

In two weeks’ time, crew from Saipan will travel to Rota to improve and extend the power distribution system with Rota line crews.