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Guyanese in the dark over true cost of power ship
Vice President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo
Kaieteur News – Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo has accused Opposition Member of Parliament (MP) David Patterson of misleading the nation on the cost that will be accrued for the rental of the Turkish power ship.
Patterson said that it will cost Guyana more than US$200M to utilise the power ship for the two-year period.
Notwithstanding Patterson’s calculations, Jagdeo did not provide a detailed account of what the country is really paying for the service, leaving Guyanese in the dark over the true cost.
Jagdeo was at the time addressing reporters at his weekly press conference on Thursday.
At a previous press-conference Jagdeo was pressed to provide the amount of money Guyana will be paying for the electricity from Karpowership International. Instead of giving a definitive answer, he said that it will cost the country nearly US$0.30 cents per Kilowatt Hour.
“When you add the two (fuel cost and the cost for rental), it comes up to nearly 0.20 something cents nearly 0.30 cents per Kilowatt hour,” Jagdeo said.
The Guyana Power and Light Company recently inked a contract with Urbacon Concessions Investments, W.L.L (UCI) to charter the Turkish vessel with a total installed capacity of 36 Megawatts (MWs) for a period of two years.
The contract, according to GPL, includes the provision of operation and maintenance services as part of the agreement.
According to the utility company in a public missive on Thursday, “the contract requires GPL to pay UCI a fee of 6.62 US cents per kWh as a monthly charter fee for the power ship and a monthly operation and maintenance fee of 0.98 US cents per kWh, based on electricity generated.”
Karpowership
The cost however excludes the price for fuel because according to the contract signed Guyana will still have to supply the power ship with fuel in addition to the agreed sum to charter the vessel.
Former subject minister David Patterson in a widely broadcast interview, had claimed that an interrogation of the information released, reveals that renting the power ship will in fact cost the country some 55 US cents to generate a megawatt of electricity and over a two-year-period, it will add up to over US$200 million.
In an invited comment, the Member of Parliament in seeking to clarify that this publication had in fact undervalued the reported payments being made for the power reminded that the agreement states that Urbacon Concessions Investment WLL will be paid US$ 0.0662 per KWh as monthly rental and US$0.0098 per Kwh as operation and maintenance charges – a total of US$0.076 per kWh for the of 36MW, “a seemingly minuscule amount, however the devil has always been in the details.”
Expounding further, Patterson reasoned that the 36MW plant x 24 hours = 864 MW at maximum daily generation and with its projected availability 96 percent of this would mean a projected daily generation of the equivalent of 830,000 kilowatts.
According to Patterson, 830,000 kilowatts x US$0.076 = US$63,080 per day and as such US$63,080 x 365 days x 2 = US$46,048,400.00 (2-year contract).
Jagdeo in his response to Patterson’s calculation last Thursday said that his calculation was incorrect and that he is misleading the nation. He questioned, “how can Patterson say that the cost for the power ship is over US$200 million, when his (Patterson) own calculation at 55 US cents per kilowatt hour projects the cost to be around US$44 million for the two-year-period.”
Jagdeo said, the true, final rental cost for the vessel is not US55 cents per kilowatt hour but when asked to give the media the correct and accurate cost, he failed to do so.
“I just said that the fuel is US13 to US14 Cents per kilowatt hour (to supply the fuel) if you add to that the 7.6 cents per kilowatt hour, you are coming around to 21 or 22 cents per kilowatt hour which it costs to generate elsewhere too not 55 cents per kilowatt hour,” Jagdeo said.
Instead of clarifying or providing further clarity, the Vice President told the media to return to Patterson to have the figures clarified.
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