The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

Bahamas Power & Light (BPL) yesterday said it is speaking to its supplier to ensure the fuel contamination that has disrupted Harbour Island's electricity over the past three weeks ceases.

Toni Seymour, the state-owned utility’s chief operating officer, said: “We had several fuel contamination issues on Harbour Island within the last two weeks. We have been in communication with our fuel supplier to make sure that this does not happen in the future.”

BPL earlier this week said it had launched an investigation into contaminated fuel that was delivered to its Harbour Island plant, leading to the failure of four generator units on the island. Contaminated fuel threatens serious damage to engines, often causing parts to be replaced, which can take time to accomplish.

“You have to replace injectors, change filters, etc… and then you have to drain the contaminated fuel, flush it and replace it with good fuel,” Ms Seymour said. “As for BPL, we apologise to the residents of Harbour Island who have experienced this repeatedly within the last two weeks, and we have worked expeditiously to prevent it from happening again.”

BPL has been plagued with fuel contamination problems over the past several months as a similar incident happened in North Andros in July 2023, leaving that island without power for over a week. FOCOL, the fuel supplier, said it was assisting BPL with its investigation into that incident.

Ms Seymour added: “We did have an issue in Acklins recently where one of our generators was damaged. Because Acklins is far away we did procure a replacement generator the same day that the incident happened, but the boat takes a while to get there.

“The Royal Bahamas Defence Force assisted us with transporting the engine and, once we got it there, we installed it and restored supply.” There were only 75 customers in Salina Point, Acklins, that were disrupted.