There’s a call for the Government to revisit the cap placed on how much electricity should be generated by any one energy source.

Currently, the National Energy Policy (NEP) outlines that no energy source should contribute more than 50 per cent to electricity generation.

This is in order to ensure that the island doesn’t become overly dependent on any specific energy source. It’s also intended to encourage energy diversification.

While speaking at the recent Jamaica Observer Business Webinar, held under the topic ‘The Future of Energy’, vice-president of generation at Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) Joseph Williams indicated that clause needs to be revised.

“That needs to be look at with the present situation that faces us. What we’re seeing is that the technologies that would use natural gas makes it easier for the integration of renewables which is the goal. With that, we have found that the technologies that utilise natural gas makes that [integration] much easier and more cost effective. I believe that the number relating to any one source of fuel being limited needs to be looked at,” said Williams.

He further added “today we’re actually looking at natural gas making up anywhere between 50-60 per cent of the production of electricity and renewables now being about 12-13 per cent of our generating share in any given period.”

A little over a decade ago, close to 90 per cent of Jamaica’s electricity was generated using heavy fuel oil.

At that time, the Government set a target of generating 20 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030. That target was later increased to 33 per cent by 2030 and now 50 per cent by 2037.

David Barrett, principal consultant of ENBAR Consulting, an energy and environment service consultancy, and founding director and past president of Jamaica Solar Energy Association, agrees that the cap on energy source should be looked at, but he contends that any change should favour increasing renewable generation.

“We have to have a fixity of purpose, if we are replacing old plants we need to consider using renewables as the replacement option and not additional fossil options. There is this 45 per cent floor where we should not depend on any one fuel so essentially what we have done is make a good move from liquid fuels to gaseous fuels which are much cleaner and do support renewables because you can turn on these plants much faster when the renewables go up and down. However, it is an opportunity to increase the amount of renewables instead of adding fossil,” Barrett argued.

He continued: “Our integrated resource plan speaks about almost 1,664 megawatt of new generation coming into 2037 and of that some 1,200 megawatt is supposed to be renewables. Renewables can be installed anywhere between two years, from approval to construction and commissioning so there is this opportunity to replace any fossil fuel option with renewables very easily. I’m talking plainly about the large commercial IPPs but if we were to improve on our net billing regulation right now we can significantly ramp up the amount of renewables used in Jamaica.”

Net billing allows JPS customers who own renewable energy generators such as wind turbines and photovoltaic (solar) systems to generate electricity for personal use, as well as sell excess energy to JPS at wholesale or “avoided cost” prices set by the Office if Utilities Regulation (OUR). The customer will, however, purchase electricity at the existing rates, as outlined in the tariff schedule.

Barrett stressed that there are no limitations in terms of financing or policy preventing the enhancement of the renewables sector, but he highlighted there are certain key areas which must be given special consideration.

“We already have policies, we have Vision 2030 which says that’s the way we want to go, we have the national energy policy, we have also agreed to things like net zero and climate change agreements so there’s obviously an intent to go forward. We already have the integrated resource plan which has directed how we should apply those renewable systems and it includes 2022-2023. There is nothing in policy that prevents that from happening,” Barrett stated.

“There are a number of locations which have been identified and there are actually proponents which have located lands which are suitable for wind, of course wind is very location specific, the terrain needs to be right and the wind regime needs to be right. Solar is ubiquitous, you can put solar anywhere from Westmoreland down to Portland so location is not going to be an issue for solar. What will be a key consideration is the amount of land that you need for the generation and you’re gonna need about 5 acres per megawatt of solar and that is dependent on how large your modules are, their generation capacity and so on, but those are specifics that you can calculate so it can be done,” he added.

On that note, he informed that there are suitable locations which were put on the table by bidders which were not successful in past bidding processes “so we already have those locations and we do have a solar and wind map for Jamaica,” he noted.

“The only other thing I’d say is that JPS would certainly have been able to identify locations that would be suitable for interconnecting the renewable options and I’m speaking about the commercial ones with the grid. The only other component that I think will be critical is to have storage and already JPS has proven with its 24.5-megawatt hybrid storage system that it works, it supports the grid and the volatility that renewables bring and if we were to go to the 1,200 megawatt of renewables JPS would have to consider either ramping that up by maybe 10-15 per cent to maintain stability of the grid or we would have to be thinking a little bit out of the box and include storage in any future bidding process,” said Barrett.