It was Commonwealth Utilities Corp. Executive Director Antonio Muna who informed Taotao Tano president Gregorio S. Cruz Jr. about the cracked engine.
“Should I do the same for engine 6 which also has a cracked foundation…down another 5 megawatts?” Muna said in an e-mail to Cruz who insisted that the vibration of the engine will further cause internal damage to the machine.
Cruz said Power Plant 2 was able to operate one unit but it later overheated after personnel failed to monitor the cooling system.
“The realization here is that even if the engines in Power Plant 1 & 2 are rehabilitated CUC will be back to square one if there is no change in the way people are monitoring or operating the engines again,” Cruz told Muna.
According to Cruz, CUC should have a back-up power plant that uses cheaper fuel so that the power supply is maintained and consumers can be charged lower power rates.
Another option for CUC, he said, is to switch to heavy fuel oil which is cheaper and cost-effective.
Muna, for his part, said Cruz is “still identifying problems but no solutions.”
He asked Cruz if Taotao Tano is advising CUC to take engine 8 offline and decrease production.
“So what do I do to replace the 10 megawatts? Load shedding until engines 7 and 5 are back up?”
He asked Cruz if Taotao Tano can address the affordability of a diesel generated power when diesel now costs $4.40 per gallon.
But according to Cruz, running the engines at less than 50 percent of their nameplate capacity is not advisable because fuel efficiency is not achieved due to incomplete combustion.
He said in a situation when the engine is not balanced, some cylinders will carry more load than the rest, which will result in more vibrations.
Due to insufficient combustion, he added, the engines will be producing more carbon resulting in the polishing of the liners and loss compression.
“Low loads may also result in the fouling up of the intake air system, resulting in further inefficiency with the present condition of the islands — we doubt CUC can stop the operations of engines #6 & 8 now, but the problem has to be corrected immediately if not sooner,” Cruz said.
He informed Muna that Taotao Tano is now communicating with the U.S. Department of the Interior concerning the CNMI’s power crisis.
CUC is a recipient of grants from Interior.
Cruz is hoping that Interior can help CUC.
“We should accept the feds’ help and work together to resolve these power plant issues and arrive at a solution,” he added.
