Emancipating Barbadians: Senior Minister Kerrie Symmonds Highlights the Importance of Business in the Energy Sector

Senior Minister Kerrie Symmonds says there must be no understating the importance of emancipating Barbadians from the burdensome impact of a lack of business in the energy sector.

He made that point during yesterday morning’s discussion of the Utilities Regulation (Amendment) Act 2023 which was later passed in the House of Assembly.

“When we say that there is a billion dollars of stalled financing in Barbados’ financial houses (the banks and the credit unions) to underwrite renewable energy investment, we are talking about the people of Barbados’ money,” Symmonds said.

“That is money that in some cases people in Barbados have already contracted to borrow and in some cases are paying interest on.”

Symmonds, who is also Minister of Foreign Trade and Foreign Affairs, illustrated his point, adding: “If an individual borrows money and they buy or make an investment but they can’t do anything because the utility in its sole discretion is not connecting them, they are still obligated to pay back the people they are borrowing from.

“Every single passing month I am driving that individual into a state of debt unless I, as Government, find a policy response. I am trying to explain this as simply as I can so that the critics out there who idly wag their tongues understand why we are here doing what we are doing.”

Symmonds also revealed that Barbados’ grid only has ten megawatts of battery storage on it which is a stumbling block in the plans to progress the sector.

“The integrated Resource Resilience Plan grossly understated Barbados economic policy response. We therefore are faced with gridlock. We can’t upload the additional energy until we have done a few things. The first thing we need to do is unlock the potential that we have stalled, the 989 megawatts have to be loaded onto the grid. The question is, how do we get to that stage?”

The Bill gives the Ministry of Energy the power to grant exemptions to renewable energy producers and that legislation was criticised by those who believe it was written to circumvent the power of the Fair Trading Commission (FTC) to regulate electricity rates.

The amendment that will come into effect in the passing of the Bill states:

“The Minister may, on the recommendation of the Commission or, on his own initiative, exempt the supply of electricity from a renewable energy resource by a renewable energy producer from the application of all or any of the provisions of this Act, where the Minister is satisfied in all circumstances that the exemption is required in the public interest.” (JC)