JAMAICA’S push toward renewable energy faces a critical limitation during extreme weather events, with the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) warning that solar, wind and battery systems cannot sustain the electricity grid during hurricanes.

Acting president and CEO of JPS, Hugh Grant said the country’s experience during Hurricane Melissa underscored a fundamental reality: When storms hit, the power system depends heavily on traditional, dispatchable generation. As the country’s sole grid operator JPS plays a central role in determining how different sources of energy are integrated and maintained during periods of system stress.

“The reality is the 23 per cent of our customers that were supplied post-Hurricane Melissa were supplied from thermal and fossil fuel resources,” Grant said during a panel discussion at the Office of Utilities Regulation’s 12th annual Director General’s Stakeholder Engagement at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel on Thursday.

“When you have a hurricane, renewables are unavailable. Days prior to the hurricane there was no solar. During the hurricane, no solar. Post-hurricane, some was destroyed and not yet back online. Wind is secured for safety reasons and is also unavailable,” he added.

The remarks point to a growing tension in Jamaica’s energy transition as policymakers push toward a target of 50 per cent renewable energy by 2030, even as the operator signals the limits of intermittent energy during extreme weather events.

Grant said that while renewable energy remains central to the country’s long-term strategy, it must be integrated alongside more resilient sources of generation capable of operating through extreme conditions. Jamaica has been accelerating its renewable buildout in recent years, with solar and wind forming an increasing share of generation capacity as part of efforts to reduce fuel imports and emissions.

“You’re depending on a dispatchable resource, not an intermittent resource, and that dispatchable resource is fossil-based generation,” he said, noting that battery storage technologies remain limited in duration.

“The longest-term battery storage you have right now is approximately eight hours at utility scale. That is the best and latest of the technology,” Grant added.

Hurricane Melissa, which struck Jamaica as a Category 5 system, left widespread damage across the electricity network but JPS said investments made prior to the storm helped to limit outages. The company reported that roughly 23 per cent of customers remained supplied immediately after the hurricane, supported by grid-hardening measures and operational improvements implemented following earlier storms.

Among those measures were changes to vegetation management, including the use of higher-tier contractors and more targeted maintenance which reduced the number of outages caused by falling trees and debris. JPS also invested in strengthening its network infrastructure, including improved communication systems that allowed operators to maintain visibility and control of the grid during the storm, enabling faster restoration through remote fault management.

Additional steps included reinforcing utility poles, reducing the distance between network spans to improve load-bearing capacity, and selectively re-routing circuits in vulnerable areas. The company is also exploring undergrounding critical infrastructure, although Grant cautioned that such measures come at a significantly higher cost.

“Undergrounding costs 15 times more than overhead systems,” he said, noting that any move in that direction would require targeted implementation and cost-sharing across sectors.

The experience has reinforced the need for a more diversified approach to energy and infrastructure planning, Grant said, arguing that resilience cannot be built around a single technology.

“Too much of any one thing is not a resilient solution,” he said.

Beyond the physical challenges, the storm has exposed a widening gap in how disaster recovery is financed. Existing mechanisms, including the Electricity Disaster Fund, have proven insufficient to cover the scale of damage caused by major events.

The Government also intervened with a US$150-million loan to JPS to support restoration following Hurricane Melissa, but that covered less than half of the estimated US$350-million cost of rebuilding the grid, underscoring the scale of the financing gap facing the sector.

Energy Minister Daryl Vaz said the decision was critical to accelerating recovery, arguing that without it, full restoration could have been delayed by months.

“The decision… is the difference between having 99 per cent restoration… or… going into 2027,” Vaz said.

Vaz stressed, however, that the Government’s role is not to bail out utilities, but to ensure that financial frameworks are in place to allow essential services to be restored quickly while protecting consumers and the wider economy.

Jamaica Stock Exchange CEO Livingstone Morrison said utilities may need to tap capital markets more aggressively to finance resilience and recovery efforts, noting that funding is available but often depends on the structure and governance of projects.

The comments come as Jamaica’s utilities face increasing pressure to strengthen infrastructure amid more intense weather events, rising global energy costs, and growing demand for reliable electricity.

Grant warned that while the transition to renewable energy is necessary, it must be carefully managed to avoid undermining grid stability during periods of crisis.

“I’m a big proponent for enabling renewables but we have to do it wisely,” he said. “If we don’t do that, it will actually set us back along the journey.”

The challenge for policymakers, he suggested, is balancing the expansion of renewable energy with the need for a power system capable of operating through increasingly severe weather events.