Oversight board says it will help speed up projects to fix Puerto Rico's electric grid

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — A federal control board that oversees Puerto Rico’s finances announced Wednesday that it will step in to help speed up projects to fix the island’s crumbling power grid as widespread outages persist.

Only $1.2 billion out of more than $17 billion authorized by U.S. Congress to stabilize the U.S. territory’s grid and improve reliability has been spent in the seven years since Hurricane Maria hit the island as a Category 4 storm, said Robert Mujica, the board’s executive director.

“We need to move faster,” he said at the board’s public meeting. “The current situation … is not acceptable.”

A growing number of Puerto Ricans frustrated by the outages are demanding that the U.S. territory’s government cancel its contract with Luma Energy, which operates the transmission and distribution of power. Several gubernatorial candidates have echoed that call, but Mujica rejected such a move.

“We cannot go back to the old system,” he said as he recognized that Puerto Rico experiences “too many power failures.”

He added that if a viable alternative is not immediately available, it would only lead to further delays. He characterized conversations about canceling the contract as “premature” and said officials need to prioritize projects that can be completed immediately as he urged federal agencies to expedite approvals and waivers.

“Every day that these funds are not deployed is another day that the people of Puerto Rico are at risk of being without power,” Mujica said.

Gov. Pedro Pierluisi, who attended the meeting, said the more than $17 billion was not “really available” until mid-2021, and that his administration has been “very creative in dealing with the bureaucratic hurdles" of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

He said his administration has been advancing money to contractors as one way to help speed up reconstruction of the grid, razed by Maria in September 2017.

Overall, Pierluisi said the government has spent 46% of FEMA funds on Maria-related reconstruction projects.

Not everyone can afford generators or solar panels on the island of 3.2 million people with a more than 40% poverty rate. Roughly 120,000 rooftop solar systems have been installed so far.

The push to move toward renewable energy on an island where fossil fuels generate about 94% of its electricity has drawn increased scrutiny to a net-metering law. In late July, the board filed a lawsuit challenging amendments to the law, which compensates solar-equipped households for their contributions to the grid.

As the board met on Wednesday, protesters gathered outside to demand that it withdraw the lawsuit, with organizers submitting a petition with 7,000 signatures in support.

Mujica said that as a result of the amendments, the independence of Puerto Rico’s Energy Bureau has “come under attack.”

The amended law prohibits the bureau from making any changes to the net metering program until 2031, at the earliest, among other things.

The board has said it is not seeking to end net metering as alleged, nor impose changes to the net metering program. It noted that if it wins the lawsuit, there would be no changes to the island’s current rooftop solar program.

The lawsuit states that the net metering terms would affect demand for the power company’s service and revenues of Puerto Rico’s Electric Power Authority, which is struggling to restructure more than $9 billion in debt.