Asphalt plant suffers from inconsistent power issues
Public Works Director Jeremy Hodge has reported ongoing difficulties with the asphalt plant in the territory, noting that an issue of inconsistent power supply has caused the plant to malfunction.
While speaking on ZBVI radio recently, Hodge said he summoned technicians to address the issue.
“We’ve had them here spot-checking before, just to make sure that the guys were operating the plant properly and everything,” Hodge said. “And they would say, yes it is, but we’ve been having frequent interruptions and it would always call for parts outside of the recommended inventory that we have in stock.”
The director explained that he had asked the technicians to work with the local team. He said they were contracted for two-and-a-half months after deciding to move forward with a plan to ramp up asphalt production to pave the Sea Cows Bay community and some areas in West End.
However, Hodge said challenges persisted with getting the plant running consistently even though the contractors were engaged with the local team, leaving him to question how the local team could be expected to fare without the hired technical expertise.
“About a week and a half, two weeks ago, while they were here, the plant went down completely,” Hodge said. “So, we’ve been in communication with them now, asking them, well, what’s going on? Because if you can’t function the plant, then where does that leave us?”
Inconsistent power damaging equipment
Hodge said technicians told him that the power being fed to the plant is inconsistent, causing the issues. “It received a couple of surges that roasted one of the motors, roasted a controller, roasted some of the electrical wiring and everything, which now we have to replace,” he disclosed.
He continued: “So the recommendation coming in is that the generator that we purchased with the plant, which was supposed to be backup, they have recommended that we hook the plant up directly to the generator to ensure that it receives a consistent flow of power.”
Hodge suggested that this temporary measure was critical as the department awaits the necessary components to enable the plant to produce asphalt again. “We’re going through the process of how to replace the parts that have been damaged in the plant. We’re working on hooking a generator up directly to it,” he said. “Once I get a consistent flow of asphalt, we can proceed to address the roads.”
Originally touted as a significant investment that would streamline local road repairs and save costs, the plant’s repeated malfunctions have posed challenges not anticipated during its acquisition. The ongoing issues have not escaped the attention of local lawmakers, who have criticised the malfunctioning plant.
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Not one of them functioning properly 5 years now
Hook up the plant directly to the generator and stop playing games with the people.
here we go again , the blame game continues , we’ll at least the UK and governor won’t be the scapegoats on this one
I never expected that to work, private cronies need to get the job and whoever got the kick-back on the purchase of the plant. Everything dinky-dory in the BVI as usual.
Now they know how we feel . Industrial voltage stabilizer disconnects power if it’s over or under certain parameters, why wouldn’t that have come as standard knowing how inconsistent & unbalanced leg to leg our power is .
A bunch of cobblers in PWD
Incompetence at its best
That the sea cows bay road wont be repaved until xmas?
Another mismanaged rinky dink project where we will spend a lot of money and never achieve the promised results. As usual nobody will be held accountable and the cycle will continue.
I smell a rat lol … yall bought the wrong plant playing cheap.
so predictable …
so they spend millions and have no low voltage or surge protectors for the power coming in, and they pay people to run this…
That asphalt plant come from TEMU or Shein. We does really get some licks around here with purchases and projects.
Government want to be in every f**king thing. Some things are better left to the private sector. Welcome to the REAL WORLD OF BUSINESS!
Where do they get power from when they are out in the field doing repairs? Doesn’t this sound strange?
dumb don’t electric cars run once they charged? you people are amazing
Forget mental illness from hurricanes. This **cking govt giving me mental illness. Serious. Everything about this govt seriously making me depressed. WTF!!
No more speed bumps in the BVI!
You knew you were going to get an asphalt plan
1. Get three young people to send away an trained in case this happens so you do not have to rely on outside help
Badmindness holding this country in shambles
another excuse for our poor roads?
yall hype this thing up to be the fixer of all problems and here we are.
BVIEC know them grid is piss poor instead they invest in solar to take some of the burden off of the grid.
oh boi
All i know is we screwed if we don’t start doing better in this place. Everything falling apart and going asunder and the premier in the news saying everything is fine and our economy booming. It seem like every government department just extremely inefficient or not equipped to function properly.
please allow me to bring up to date , WE have become more creative – WE ARE NOW USING THE POTHOLES AS A SIMPLER SOLUTION TO SLOW DOWN THE TRAFFIC BETTER THAN THE SPEEDBUMPS , AND IT IS GOING TO SAVE US MILLIONS OF $$$$$ / SOME OF YA’LL WON’T SEE THE GENIUS IN US NOW , BUT YA’LL WILL THANK US WHEN YA’LL REALISE HOW GREAT WE ARE
This is the best joke of the day but could actually be part of their strategy. Thanks for the laugh!!
How’s the incinerator?
How is our airline doing?
How are we getting on with the greenhouses?
How is the Old Peoples Home in Spooners going along?
How is the west End Ferry building doing?
How is the Admin building getting on?
How are we getting on repairing road lights after Irma?
How are we doing with the KPMG report about the airport so we can make a decision?
How are we getting with the bus service. We have a second set of bus shelters but no buses?
How it going with Prospect Reef?
How is it going with the opposition? Why they not want these answers?
Hiw is it going with letting Skelton through security checks without being checked? They interesred in that.
Really. How is it all going?
Surely if we have already paid for an emergency generator it would have been previously connected between the incoming power supply and the plant with a automatic switch over when dirty power high or low is detected by a simple voltage stabilizer on the switching gear the generator kicks in preventing damage to the plant .
Another shambles…No wonder we have nothing to show for the billions of government expenditure since the 1980s.
Gov of the BVI = Predictable(not in a good way) and absolutely Useless!! Scary to know we still have 2 years of them to deal with
Really.
Yes who really got the kickback???? Time for answers. Really. Ahh. Another National security issue to protect the accomoplises in all this corruption. We got to stop doing this.
The other day I was down by Ashley plant waiting to get asphalt. The operator incountered a problem . He knew exactly where to go to solve his problem n in less than 5 minutes he fixed his problem fire the plant n we was out of their in less than 30 minutes. He young but very experienced.. n he knows his work .
They dont care, they want to buy new generators and enjoy the kick backs, its deliberate. Not just that, but lots of home owners and business equipments also are affected by the frequent on and off electricity.I can recall in late 1990s a resident took them to court for damaging their house hold appliances and won that case.
Read the manual properly nah man