‘This is another excuse for not complying,’ says governor about LUMA’s power outage report to PREB

“LUMA has been paid everything it is owed and everything that was contracted with them, to the point that a payment of more than $900 million for their services has been certified,” Gov. Jenniffer González Colón said at a press conference in Vega Baja.

By THE STAR STAFF

Gov. Jenniffer González Colón lashed out on Thursday against the executives of the LUMA Energy consortium for stating to the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau (PREB) that power outages and the time without service for customers increased due to a lack of funds.

“LUMA has been paid everything it is owed and everything that was contracted with them, to the point that a payment of more than $900 million for their services has been certified,” the governor said at a press conference in Vega Baja. “If they have expenses greater than what they contracted for, or if they are not using the funds properly, the reality is that they even have federal funds allocated for cleaning and vegetation removal that they are not using. I think this is just another excuse for not complying. This is just another excuse to demonstrate their inefficiency.”

“How is it possible that the rest of the companies that have public-private partnerships with the government of Puerto Rico are complying?,” she continued. “Metropistas is complying, San Juan Ports is complying, Aerostar is complying, Genera is complying, but they [LUMA] are the only public-private partnership that is not complying with what they agreed to with the government.”

“You can reach an agreement with them, they say yes in a meeting, and then two or three weeks later they change their minds,” González Colón added. “So they are not a company that one can trust.”

Energy Czar Josué Colón Ortiz insisted that LUMA has been disbursed the funds owed. He also compared them to the Genera PR consortium, which, according to the government, has met the established goals.

“In other words, if you have a partner in a business that does not operate according to what was contracted and much less uses the available funds efficiently, prudently, and reasonably, as they are supposed to do and as they committed to by contract, then that partner simply cannot continue in the business,” he said. “So that is just another excuse that we do not accept.”

The governor’s remarks came during the start of the installation of Tesla batteries in Vega Baja. This battery project, which will provide 430 megawatts, is Tesla’s largest in the United States and its territories.

As reported by the STAR, LUMA’s chief regulatory officer, Alejandro Figueroa, reported earlier this week that the private operator of the island’s energy grid submitted a quarterly metrics report to the PREB confirming an increase in power outages and the average time a customer spends without electricity, by 16.2% and 3.3%, respectively, during the second quarter of the current fiscal year.

The LUMA executive attributed the situation to a lack of funding. He expressed concern about the deficit of more than $400 million in the emergency fund, which continues to grow.