‘New substation can save T&TEC $300m’
THE Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC) will soon be able to boost its power supply to customers throughout the country.
A $100 million substation at Gandhi Village, Debe, expected to be completed in December would allow T&TEC to utilise full capacity of the Trinidad Generation Unlimited (TGU) plant at La Brea.
The TGU plant was specifically built to service both the abandoned smelter project and the new industries at Union Estate and across the road in La Brea. TGU has a capacity of 720MW, but was only supplying the transmitter and distributor, the T&TEC with 400MW.
Energy Minister Kevin Ramnarine, Public Utilities Minister Nizam Baksh, T&TEC general manager Kelvin Ramsook and others toured the Gandhi Village substation yesterday.
Ramnarine said, “The purpose of this visit is to gain appreciation for where this project is. This is one of the most important projects in the country right now. The purpose of this project is for us to utilise the full capacity of the TGU power plant at La Brea. At present T&TEC, because of infrastructural constraints, they cannot utilise the full capacity of TGU. They are now utilising about half the capacity of TGU.”
He said the nationwide blackout last year would have been prevented if TGU was being operated at full capacity.
“If we were able to use the full capacity from December when this project will be finished it will save T&TEC approximately $300 million per year in reduced purchases of gas from NGC. TGU’s gas is very efficient, it has the best thermal efficiency of all the power plants in Trinidad and Tobago and some may argue with the most efficient power plants in the Caribbean,” he said…READ MORE