THE Guyana Sugar Corporation (GUYSUCO) is refuting an article published last Saturday in the Kaieteur News headlined “Skeldon Co – Gen plant out of operation, blackout hits Skeldon.”

The article stated, in part: “The generating equipment at Skeldon Sugar Factory were down for maintenance over the past couple of weeks and this has resulted in heavy blackouts for the residents of the Upper Corentyne area.”
However, according to a press release issued yesterday by the corporation, the Kaieteur News article is “plainly wrong.”
The release explained that the Skeldon Co-Gen plant supplies constantly on an hourly basis throughout the day an average of 5.5 to 6.0 mega watts (MW) to the Berbice grid.
“At the moment power is being generated by two of the three Wartsila plants and the factory turbine generator. The generating capacity of these two Wartsila sets is 2.5 MWh (mega watts per hour) each,” it stated.
According to the release, during the grinding operations of the sugar factory power is also supplied to the grid from the factory turbine generator at about 3.0 MWh using bagasse fuel. It further advised that the factory has been consistently crushing canes for the past 12 weeks.
In addition, the release revealed that repair is currently being done to the third Wartsila set, which is the largest of the three with a generating capacity of five MWh.
It noted that this generator has been out of operation for the past 18 months, due to an electrical failure. Nevertheless, GUYSUCO said through the release that this set is expected to be in operation for the coming Christmas season.