Electrical fault results in power dip

An electrical fault on Wednesday resulted in power surges and disruptions throughout TT and affected the country’s desalination company. A statement by T&TEC on the matter said at approximately 8.30 pm on May 29 an electrical fault occurred on T&TEC’s 132 KV transmission lines from Brechin Castle/Desalcott substation and AUM/Desalcott substation.

The desalination company established in 1999 sells desalinated sea water to the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA), Desalcott’s website says. Desalcott supplies water to WASA through a water sale agreement.

The statement added the affected lines were part of the grid that “feeds high voltage current to the entire country.”

It added while domestic customers did not suffer outages, they experienced a “momentary dip/surge” in electricity during the restoration exercise at around 9.25 pm.

Desalcott’s supply, which was affected by the “initial fault,” the statement said, was “fully restored just after 11 pm.”

In a phone interview with Public Utilities Minister Robert Le Hunte said he was advised and was liaising with T&TEC on the matter.

He said no residential customers in TT experienced an outage but rather experienced a surge which was temporary.

He added Desalcott was shut down for “about an hour” but that the operations were restarted. He said T&TEC advised him all technical matters which caused the problem have been resolved.

He said the effects of Desalcott being down were very minimal and there were no major reasons to “put any emergency plans in place.”

Le Hunte said Desalcott represented about 20 per cent of TT’s water supply and TT still had water coming from 80 per cent of the country. He added, however, that Desalcott if came down it would be significant, but systems were in place such as water trucking services and the ability to move water for people who usually got their supply from Desalcott.

He said WASA had an elaborate contingency plan to deal with emergencies when certain areas were shut down but “this did not necessitate anything like that.”