The Barbados Light & Power Company’s (BLPC) bid to recover nearly $79 million from electricity consumers is being challenged by intervenor and consumer advocate Tricia Watson.
The attorney at law, one of the country’s more outspoken advocates, is arguing the utility company has failed to justify both the cost and the process behind its major grid modernisation project.
In formal submissions filed with the Fair Trading Commission (FTC) on Thursday, Watson urged regulators to reject the utility company’s application to pre-approve four synchronous condensers and allow their costs (estimated at $78.7 million) to be recovered through the Clean Energy Transition Rider (CETR), a charge that appears on every electricity bill.
The intervention sets the stage for what could be another contentious regulatory battle between intervenors and the FTC.
“My role in this proceeding is to ensure that whatever the commission decides, it decides correctly, on a complete record, through a fair process, and in a way that genuinely serves the long-term interest of Barbadian electricity consumers,” Watson said in a press statement released yesterday.
“I am not opposed to grid modernisation. I am opposed to consumers being asked to pay more than they should, on terms that have not been properly justified,” she added.
The dispute surrounds synchronous condensers, large rotating machines designed to stabilise voltage and frequency on electricity networks increasingly powered by renewable energy sources.
With Barbados moving away from diesel-generated electricity and expanding solar and wind generation, such equipment is widely regarded as important for maintaining grid reliability.
Wrong cost-recovery vehicle
The Light & Power Company has asked the FTC for permission to purchase four 20 MVAr synchronous condensers and pass the costs directly to customers through the CETR mechanism.
However, Watson believes that the utility is attempting to use the wrong cost-recovery vehicle.
According to her, the CETR was originally created to deal with volatile and unpredictable expenses beyond the utility’s control, such as fluctuations in fuel prices. By contrast, she contends, synchronous condensers represent a long-planned capital investment that the company has known about for years.
She noted that during its 2021 rate review Light & Power projected the cost of synchronous condensers at about $40.8 million and included them in its investment planning.
“Costs that a utility has known about for over six years and could have included in a normal rate review are not the kind of costs the CETR was created to handle,” Watson said.
Instead, she said, the investment should be reviewed through the traditional rate-base process, where proposals are subjected to public oral hearings, cross-examination and detailed scrutiny by regulators and intervenors.
Watson also questioned whether the utility company had selected the most appropriate technical solution for Barbados.
She pointed to recommendations from one of the company’s consultants, who reportedly favoured several smaller synchronous condensers distributed around the island to provide fault-level support and voltage stability.
The current application, however, proposes fewer but larger units concentrated at a smaller number of locations.
Watson argued that BLPC had failed to explain why it departed from what she described as the consultant’s “deliberate, reasoned design philosophy”.
“It has materially deviated from the consultant’s recommendation without explaining why this is better for Barbados,” she said.
Budget estimate
Another concern is the project’s price tag.
Watson told the FTC that the energy company issued its request for proposals to suppliers on June 19, the same day intervenors’ submissions were due, meaning the $78.7 million figure remains a budget estimate rather than a contractually supported cost.
She warned that if the commission approves the application now, ratepayers could begin funding a project whose final cost remains unknown.
“Ratepayers will begin paying charges based on a cost that nobody yet knows, with no guaranteed mechanism to refund any overcharge,” she argued.
The attorney also raised concerns about what she described as shortcomings in the regulatory process.
She said a key 100-page engineering study completed in December 2023 was not included when BLPC filed its application in December 2025 and was only disclosed six months later after being compelled through interrogatories. According to Watson, the document was produced just three days before intervenors were required to submit their written arguments.
She further alleged that several lawful requests for information went unanswered and that the FTC failed to compel disclosure.
Among the remedies she is seeking are outright rejection of the application, an independent technical assessment by a consultant with no prior involvement in the matter, and a full audit of BLPC’s earnings between 2021 and 2026.
Watson claims the utility may have earned more than $205 million above its authorised return during that period, a figure she believed warrants detailed examination before additional costs are imposed on consumers. (BA/PR)
