JPS power restoration tops 99 per cent after Hurricane Melissa, Vaz tells Parliament

Just 1,343 Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) customers are still waiting for their lights to come back on after Hurricane Melissa knocked out their supply when the storm struck the island on October 28 last year, Energy Minister Daryl Vaz has told Parliament.

Speaking on Tuesday during his presentation in the Sectoral Debate, Vaz said grid restoration has now reached 99.81 per cent islandwide.

A parish-by-parish look at the outstanding cases shows 1,283 customers in Westmoreland and another 60 in St Elizabeth are yet to be reconnected. According to Vaz, roughly 40 per cent of those — some 538 premises — cannot be safely re-energised because of damage to the properties themselves.

The minister said the pace of the remaining work is being held back by rough terrain, restricted access to far-flung communities, unfavourable weather, and difficult ground conditions. He indicated that the closing stretch of the recovery effort will move steadily, with smaller numbers of customers reconnected each day.

Vaz also used his contribution to praise JPS, describing the utility's response since Melissa as best-in-class. “When you benchmark with other utilities, the data shows clearly that JPS' performance is nearly twice as good as its peers in other developing countries and almost on par with best-in-class utilities in developed countries with far more resources,” he said.

Drawing a comparison with Puerto Rico, which took a hit from Category 4 Hurricane Maria in 2017, the minister observed that the United States territory is slightly smaller than Jamaica yet has a gross domestic product seven times the size of Jamaica's, along with the backing of the US federal government.

“Here in Jamaica, two months after we got a direct hit by the Category 5 Hurricane Melissa, 90 per cent of JPS' customers had electricity. In Puerto Rico, two months after being hit by Hurricane Maria, 40 per cent of their customers had electricity,” he said.

Vaz further noted that Puerto Rico needed nearly a full year to bring service back to 99 per cent of its customers following Maria. “JPS accomplished 99 per cent in four months. At the four-month mark, Puerto Rico was at 57 per cent,” he said.