EDITOR, The Tribune.

As the battle rages on about whether the BEC/BPL rates are too high, or whether they have increased by 60% or 70%, there is one thing that everyone seems to agree on and that is that electricity costs far too much.

O.K. BEC/BPL can’t help themselves because they are too burdened with legacy debt, so they are stuck with the same old generators that the UBP left them with back in the day.

Now, we all know the modus operandi of two particularly large business behemoths, Airbnb and Uber, the former now being the largest hotel company in the world and it doesn’t own a single hotel or room, and the other, the largest taxi company in the world that doesn’t own a single vehicle, nor has a single employee driving one. Both of these miracle businesses use someone else’s assets to power their business and simply take a cut in the middle.

It has long been discussed, if not actually begged for by the public, for BEC/BPL to offer net metering, but no government yet has seen the wisdom in doing this. I heard yesterday that there is a trial on 200 homes here but that is a drop in the bucket, compared to the number of consumers in the Bahamas. Just imagine if the several hundred thousand BEC/BPL customers covered their roofs (and whatever else they have) with duty free solar panels, that were generating electricity all day long, and automatically SELLING it to BEC/BPL, while the homeowner was out at work. Now extend this to the Out Islands, which are also a problem for BEC/BPL. I have a feeling that maybe they would not need the two generators destroyed by arson.

We need to think outside on the box now and then.

BRUCE G.RAINE

Nassau,

November 9, 2018.