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CUC to lift rolling blackouts
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Posted on Oct 27 2006
Starting Monday, the Commonwealth Utilities Corp. will finally lift the rotating blackouts that the utility agency has been implementing on Saipan in the past few months.
CUC deputy director Patrick Deleon Guerrero told Saipan Tribune yesterday that CUC is canceling the load shedding schedule beginning next week.
Deleon Guerrero, however, said that there are still maintenance issues at the power plants and, if engine no. 8 starts to overheat, then CUC may still implement load shedding.
Deleon Guerrero said they are “pretty sure that they will be able to handle everything” without dropping the power.
“Engine No. 8 should be up later by tomorrow and we will be able to take care of just about everything. It’s still being tested right now, but I told them to be very careful on the testing. If you take your time, you have the whole weekend to do the testing. So there is no rush to take risks. I’m telling them to take their time. We don’t want to take a big step backward after going this far,” he said.
The deputy director said they are very excited with the cancellation of the outage schedule.
“It is in the best interest of CUC and the public, the businesses, when we keep the power on without any load shedding because the load shedding also has an impact on CUC operations,” he said.
Deleon Guerrero said the public should be mindful that many of the power engines are “very way overdue” for overhauling and servicing.
“ So if there’s any problem in those engines, we may fall back into a similar situation. Whether it is tomorrow or two months from tomorrow, it is hard to tell,” he said.
“We are operating 24 hours and have no opportunity to slow down. So the chances for mechanical failure are always there when you are dealing with parts,” he added.
