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GPL to spend about $100M to repair damaged submarine cable
GPL is set to spend $100M on a damaged
submarine cable across the Demerara River
A spate of outages facing sections of Demerara is not likely to go away anytime soon, as critical repairs to a damaged submarine power cable across the Demerara will take weeks.
The Guyana Power and Light Inc. (GPL) will likely have to spend up to $100M to replace the damaged section of the cable linking the Kingston and Vreed-en-Hoop, officials have said.
The submarine cable was part of a major project to inter-connect the Berbice and Demerara grids. With a new 26 megawatts Wartsila plant providing extra power, the East Demerara area had been badly depending on it being brought via the submarine cable.
Residents have been complaining bitterly about an increasing spate of blackouts, in especially places like Eccles and Republic Park, East Bank Demerara.
GPL officials disclosed that a replacement cable will have to be shipped in, and in addition to repairs it is expected that this could take between 45-60 days.
The damage to the cable has also raised troubling questions about its actual laying.
While the cable was said to be an armored one, it apparently was no match for the propellers of one vessel. Technicians retrieving the damaged cable from the Demerara River recently found it chopped in several places.
“We are concerned as it appeared that the cable should have been buried more…at least three metres in the solid area beneath the river,” a senior operations official said.
The Demerara River is heavily traversed by vessels, including ships and tugs. It is believed that one of the vessels snagged the cable and damaged it in July, cutting the flow of power between east and west Demerara.
“It is the feeling that we may have to add another protection to the actual cable…what you would call sleeving to protect it more. Also, we will recommend that the cable be buried deeper on both ends,” the GPL official said.
“One can surmise that the cable initially was badly installed. It would have been buried inland from the power stations so when it reaches the water, it is deep down. The outages we are experiencing are because we don’t have the generation to aid in constant power in especially in the East Demerara area. There is little backup.”
The submarine cable had been part of a major US$40M-plus project commissioned last year to install new transmission lines and build seven sub-stations.
A key report, dated November 2014, was submitted to GPL on that project by Caribbean Engineering and Management Consultants, Inc. (CEMCO), a local firm that had partnered with SMP Engineering, a Canadian outfit, to supervise the project.
The report had raised questions about the installation of the submarine cable. The consultants urged that it be re-examined.
The report pointed out that it is possible that the life of the cable may have been compromised during installation due to the methods employed and the possible dragging of the cables by fuel boats that were traversing the Demerara River.
As an alternative to a second submarine cable, GPL may have to consider an overhead transmission line at a suitable point along the Demerara River, the consultants had urged.
The report had blistered the Chinese contractor and noted that the pre-qualification or post-qualification assessments were either not performed or inadequately performed during the tender and selection phase of the project.
The evidence was clear that China National Machinery Import & Export Corporation (CMC) was ill-prepared for what it takes to run a project of this magnitude, the report had said.
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