GPL overhauls causing blackouts

Some areas within the Demerara Interconnected System (DIS)  will be without power for a maximum of four hours daily until all the maintenance work currently being done on a few engines within  the DIS is completed.

GPL said in a press release yesterday that  these overhauls have created a shortfall in the generating capacity and  some amount of load shedding has to be done.

These major overhauls  that are currently being done are all in preparation  for the end-of-year period when power demand tends to increase.  The power company said  that during this year it  did routine maintenance on all its engines and maintenance time is calculated and scheduled over a 500-hour period.

The 5.5 MW No.3 Wartsila engine at Kingston is down for a major overhaul that began last Monday and this procedure is expected to last for two weeks.

And the 3.5 MW No.4 Crossly engine at Garden of Eden is also down for maintenance that should also last about two weeks.

But while that engine is out of operation, the No.2 Crossly set that was out for quite a while at Garden of Eden  would be brought on to work in its place, GPL said.

And at Versailles the 2.2 MW No.6 General Motors engine is also down for maintenance and work is now in progress to have it operable as soon as possible.

GPL in appealing to its customers to be patient also said  that its engineers are working tirelessly to ensure that the engines are restored in a timely manner and assured that power supply will be considerably im-proved.