Genera PR ordered to comply with costs program

By The Star Staff

To enforce compliance with costs, the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau (PREB), through a resolution and order, ordered legacy power plants operator Genera PR earlier this week to comply with the costs programs established for the acquisition of emergency peak generation systems in the Jobos, Daguao and Palo Seco plants.

According to the regulator, “the delays and cost increases of the project were the result of misrepresentations by Genera PR, particularly in its commitment to maintain the original costs and schedule proposed by the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA).”

“If Genera had reason to believe that the schedule and costs would increase, it was its responsibility to promptly notify us,” the document stated. “Since Genera guaranteed that it would maintain the schedule and costs and failed to promptly notify us of the alleged project cost overruns and delays, it must now fully comply with what it represented in terms of time and costs, which led to the approval of the reconfiguration of the NEPR [the initials in Spanish for the Energy Bureau] Project Proposals (RFPs).”

The PREB ordered Genera to complete the project and achieve commercial operation by the end of spring 2026, in accordance with PREPA’s original proposal. It also determined that failure to comply with thE order will result in daily penalties of up to $25,000 for each day that the project remains incomplete beyond the established date.

“Our Office reserves the right to impose additional sanctions should further misrepresentations or delays be discovered during the course of the project,” PREB Chairman Edison Avilés Deliz said.

According to the document, Genera has maintained that its approach could reduce the completion time by nine to 12 months, but is now proposing a completion time sometime in 2027.