CUC grid reaches critical state
The Commonwealth Utilities Corp.’s electrical grid has reached a critical state due to the lack of funding.
In his report to the CUC board, Power Division manager Gary Camacho said that critical state means an increase in the number of power outages, the creation of unnecessary expenses, dangerous risks, hardships for power customers, a critical impact on Saipan’s economic growth, and the effect on other critical CUC services such as water and wastewater.
“It is very difficult for our community that our power is unreliable, not knowing when you’re going to have power, and even nowadays the weather doesn’t have to be bad to have power outages,” Camacho said.
He said that they have had several customers and businesses complaining about power outages and that they try to work as quickly as they could to resolve the issue.
Camacho said that CUC’s primary lines are severely dilapidated, affecting the power distribution in 26 villages on Saipan.
“This is something that we have been trying to address as far back as 2008 and it is getting worse,” he said.
Line clearing has also been a very big challenge for CUC due to equipment needs, according to Camacho.
“The vegetation has grown past the power poles and we don’t have the time for clearing the lines, so now we just move the poles, which also causes more time for other services,” he said.
Camacho said it costs about $10,000 a month to clear the lines and he hopes they could find a contractor to resolve this issue.
CUC board chair Dave Sablan Jr. recommended an invitational bid to be proposed for possible contractors who might do the line clearing and clear the vegetation from power lines.
Sablan also agreed that CUC should be charging customers who have trees or vegetation growing around power poles or have them clear it. Camacho said that they will have to notify customers of the vegetation trimming.
CUC serves over 14,000 customers and has about 11,450 poles.
One other issue is that CUC lacks pole hardware and that it is difficult to change power poles at the moment.
Progress
According to Camacho, they have done an “operational sweep” that identified 200 incidents of utility theft, they have certified linemen for power poles, more accurate mapping systems, improvements on systems for CUC, net meters, and load analysis for prepaid metered customers.
CUC also completed the replacement of a defective switchgear at American Memorial Park that provides power to the hotels nearby, completed 80 240-volt kWh meter retrofits to 208-volt kWh meters, 18 job orders for line clearing, and have identified and reported 10 meter tampering and 16 illegal power connections.
CUC staffing has increased a little for the Power Division with 51 personnel that includes one management, four administrative staff, 19 engineers and meter inspectors, and 27 distribution linemen.
Sablan said that they will need CUC management to progress more on important issues.
CUC executive director Alan Fletcher said that the integrated resource planning is on the way as well as a few contractors for renewable energy and more improvements on services.
how long more can you hang on with this management, Gary. Thanks to you. You should have mentioned the unfair management practice of giving much higher wage rate to fellow americans working at the plant than to locals. Is your established staking database been transferred to the new “enhanced” program? I wonder why would CUC program be replaced without proper studies. Cost millions neh, just to find out that it could not import your staking info, work orders, etc. I heard this was a rush deal that inspite of concerns from people about this program, people who had been with CUC for a long time, the next day, a decision was made to purchase the program. Sad, if these are true, cause even the board are so blind of the true happenings out there.
The procurement of the new billing system at CUC took over a year, and all managers, including Mr. Camacho were involved in the process. The system chosen was the result of a competitive bidding and selection process.
really? it wasn’t about how long, it was how it was conducted. you can always fool yourself, that’s your right.
Alan Fletcher and Gary Camacho,
If you guys are saying that the CUC’s electrical grid has reached a critical state, then why for the sake of humanity did CUC had the Legislature pass a law requiring all hotels to hook up to the CUC grid?????? Is it because you guys didn’t do your homework??? Or is it because you and executive director Alan Fletcher are both INCOMPETENT???? So can the both of you explain this to the people of the CNMI most especially to the hotels that are required to hook up to the CUC grid???? Alan and Gary, the reason for the federal Stipulation Orders is, because past management had too many excuses like no funding for this, no funding for that, but when Mr. Abe Utu Malae came to CUC, he found the funding’s and got things moving forward at CUC. Mr. Malae accomplished a lot at CUC in less than 2 years!!!! The leadership of director Alan Fletcher is nothing but a FAILURE!!!!! Too many excuses when asked by the media!!!! If he wants to improve CUC and address the issues with the federal Stipulation Orders, he should start by removing some of his INCOMPETENT managers and supervisors, employees who are stealing from CUC and its customers and employees who are drug users, employees who report to work intoxicated and many more!!!!! Vice Speaker Frank Dela Cruz tried to have director Alan Fletcher removed/fired from CUC, but governor Eloy Inos refused to fire director Fletcher from his post!!!! With you the Voters of the CNMI, CHANGE can happen on November 04!!!!! Estaaaaaaa
Guardian, there is no law requiring all hotels to hook up to the CUC grid. Also, the Legislature does not do the bidding of CUC, as evidenced by your statement that Vice Speaker Dela Cruz managed to get resolution adopted by the House to have Fletcher removed.
You are right that Mr. Malae made great progress in the short time he was with CUC, however, the government was not $23 million in arrears on its utility bills during his tenure.
CUC does have a zero tolerance drug policy in place, and employees are being tested. Those testing positive are dealt with in accordance with CUC’s personnel regs.