“Breakdowns are the rule now” if the power plant engines will not be overhauled soon, he said.
Muna said Power Plant 1’s engine #3 is producing about four megawatts of power only while engine #8 has been down for about a week.
Engine #8 has a significant crack on its foundation and needs a major overhaul.
Muna said only engines #2, 3, and 6 were online yesterday.
CUC has signed contracts worth $10 million for the repair of its power plant engines.
On Thursday evening, the entire island was hit by a power outage due to electrical problems with Power Plant 1’s engine #6 and its auxiliary power unit.
CUC stated that at about 7 p.m., “an electrical fault on the Jacket Cooling Water Motor caused Engine No. 6 and Station Service No. 3 at Power Plant 1 to automatically trip.”
The immediate loss of power generation at the Lower Base power plant overloaded the Power Plant 4 engines in Puerto Rico, resulting in an islandwide power outage, CUC explained.
The agency said its crew members first tried to restore the power on Feeder 3: 1st Partial from Power Plant 4 several times but failed.
“It was not until 10 p.m. that the first feeder was energized,” CUC said, adding its engine #6 was brought back online at 6:18 a.m. on Saturday, June 21.
CUC added, “The control of Unit 3 had electrical and mechanical malfunctions and required immediate replacement.”
The engine was brought back online at 7 a.m. on Saturday, “which provided the additional generation required to complete the restoration process.”
